Inner Loop of Beltway reopens after fatal crash

WASHINGTON — All lanes of the Inner Loop of the Beltway were blocked near Branch Avenue in Prince George’s County for more than four hours Christmas morning after a head-on collision that killed one person and injured another.

Franklin Moreno-Dunn, 25, of Fort Washington, Maryland was killed driving a Honda Civic in the southbound lanes of the Beltway near Branch Avenue when his car was hit head-on. The driver of the Lexus — which was headed the wrong way — has been identified as  27-year-old Courtney Isiah Benjamin Jackson of White Plains, Maryland.

There’s no information on how Jackson came to be driving the wrong way in the southbound lanes of the Beltway. The collision is still under investigation.

The crash happened at about 3:30 a.m. and involved a wrong-way driver, the Maryland State Police say. The road was reopened shortly after 8.

Two silver-colored vehicles “look like balls of tinfoil,” WTOP’s Nick Iannelli reports.

Two lanes of the Outer Loop had also been blocked off to allow cars stuck in the Inner Loop make a U-turn and use the left side of the Outer Loop to get out of the jam. Those lanes reopened at about 6:30 a.m.

Update: The family of Moreno-Dunn has established a GoFundMe site to raise money for his funeral. 

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