A single-vehicle crash took the life of a Punta Gorda man on Saturday morning. The Florida Highway Patrol reports that 24-year-old Joshua Clayton Stewart was traveling north on Florida Street in a 1998 Ford Explorer, approaching Dundee Road at around 10:40 AM. That’s when he crossed the southbound lane and went onto the west shoulder, where his vehicle struck a utility pole. The Explorer continued north, hitting a tree and spinning before winding up against a guardrail. Stewart was not wearing a seatbelt. It was not immediately known whether alcohol was a factor in the crash.
