Family Mourns Loss Of Rogers County Man Killed In Tragic Crash

A Rogers County family is planning a funeral after Mike Tarvin was hit by a driver that troopers say was high and has never had a driver's license.

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Mike's family and friends say he was a hard-working man who loved his family and will be deeply missed.

His family says he was a long haul trucker who worked hard to provide for his family and sacrificed in order to make sure his kids were successful. His son's an attorney and his daughter was in naval intelligence and now a school teacher.

They say their father always told them they could do anything, be anything if they put their minds to it. Mike was 21 when he married his sweetheart Kathy.

They recently celebrated their 43rd anniversary. They have two kids and two grandkids.

The only other love of his life was Marcia, his new Harley Street Glide. Just last week, he took it on a 2,000-mile journey to Colorado with his best friend of more than 40 years.

Howard Perkins, Mike’s best friend, says, "He was just the most moral, upright, righteous guy. Never drank, never smoked, never said anything bad about anybody. He really was [a] good guy."

Howard says Mike was always a safe driver, wore his helmet, used his signals and loved seeing the sights of the open road.

Perkins said, "I kidded him, I said, 'we're in the mountains of the million dollar highway and these kids on BMW's are zipping past us' and he said, 'I don't care, these curves are dangerous, I'm going slow'."

Troopers say Derrick Carter has never had a driver's license and was driving high when he ran a stop sign and slammed into Mike on Highway 66 on Saturday.

Carter is currently on a deferred sentence for a 2018 drug case and declined my request for an interview. Mike's family says their focus right now is all the memories they have of Mike and the joy he brought to their lives.

"He was an amazing man, really was. You can look at his family, his kids, the way he raised them and that tells you what kind of person he was. We should all aspire to be what Mike was," said Perkins.

Mike's funeral will be Monday, the day after Father's Day.