“To this day, to me, it just feels like she's lost,” Tristen Cherry tells PEOPLE of fiancée Katelyn Callahan
Credit: Samantha Koch Photography of Tulsa
NEED TO KNOW
- Last May, a 23-year-old nursing student died in a wrong-way crash in Oklahoma just weeks before her wedding
- Now, her fiancé and family are sharing how they’re moving forward and continuing to heal
- “We have a bond, and that bond holds us together, and that bond is Katelyn,” Tristen Cherry tells PEOPLE
Last spring, a 23-year-old nursing student died in a crash just weeks before her wedding. A year later, her fiancé, who was critically injured, is still healing — as is her family now that the driver responsible is behind bars.
“To this day, to me, it just feels like she's lost,” Tristen Cherry tells PEOPLE of fiancée Katelyn Callahan, who died coming back from a music festival after their car was hit by a wrong-way driver in Oklahoma on May 2, 2025.
Despite the shattering loss, Cherry says his connection with her family, and vice versa, remains as solid as it ever was.
“We're one family,” the 25-year-old college student says in a joint interview with some of Callahan’s family members. “We have a bond, and that bond holds us together, and that bond is Katelyn… She keeps it strong."
Credit: Courtesy of Melissa Callahan
The night of the crash was rainy. Cherry fell asleep in the front passenger seat as Callahan drove him, his stepsister and her friend, both 17, back from the Calf Fry Music Festival, a popular event featuring country and red dirt bands in Stillwater, Okla.
He remembers waking up to a scream as blinding headlights flooded their windshield. Cherry managed to say, “Katelyn, I love you,” before they were hit.
The bride-to-be was pronounced dead at the scene, while Cherry and the two teens riding in the back seat were transported to local hospitals.
The driver of the other vehicle, 29-year-old Sergio Ibarra, and his 36-year-old passenger were admitted to hospitals in "fair condition," authorities said in a statement previously obtained by PEOPLE.
Ibarra was later charged with manslaughter in the first degree as well as three counts of driving under the influence, causing great bodily injury, according to the Oklahoma Highway Patrol. The investigating trooper believes Ibarra was under the influence of drugs and alcohol at the time of the crash, an agency spokesperson confirms to PEOPLE.
Almost a year later, on March 18, Ibarra entered a blind plea of guilty and was sentenced to 45 years in prison, the Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement. He remains in custody.
Credit: Samantha Koch Photography of Tulsa
For the young woman’s loved ones, the past year has been filled with heartbreak and painful legal proceedings.
But, as mom Mellisa Callahan tells PEOPLE, now that the criminal proceedings have ended, she believes "we can actually start" healing.
More than anything, they're committed to keeping Katelyn’s memory alive.
“She was tiny, but you knew who she was the moment she walked in the room because she had the loudest voice and the biggest personality,” says Katelyn’s proud mom. “She was just so welcoming to anyone.”
The young woman dreamed of becoming a labor and delivery nurse, attending Oklahoma State University alongside Cherry, who is studying construction management and technology.
"It was impossible not to have enormous respect for her courage, tenacity, and authenticity," says Katelyn's former college roommate, Samantha Koch, who shot the couple's engagement photos.
She adds, "Photographing the love she and [Tristen] shared would become (and is today) the most important thing I have ever done."
Before the crash, Cherry and Katelyn's future seemed set.
The couple would graduate in May, get married and then continue to build their lives together with their two precious dogs.
Their trip to Calf Fry was just another joyous stop on the road — and Cherry says he still watches the video from that night of his fiancée on his shoulders, so she could better see the stage.
“She got the best seat in the house,” he remembers.
In the aftermath of the crash, Cherry was in a medically induced coma for weeks while recovering from numerous serious injuries: 64 facial fractures, a broken arm and femur, brain trauma and internal bruising, to name a few.
He wasn’t able to communicate, but remembers having visions of trying to find Katelyn and running down hallways as he searched for her.
Melissa says medical staff didn’t allow them to tell Cherry about his beloved’s death until May 15, the day after her funeral.
“They were afraid it would make him agitated and make his recovery worse,” she says.
Although the two teens in the car are now fully recovered and preparing to enter college, Cherry's recovery process has been more difficult, both emotionally and physically.
He’s now partially blind in one eye and walks with a lift in his shoe to make up for the missing inch and a half of femur bone. He aches constantly and can feel the metal that’s been implanted when he touches his face. But he says none of the unending pain he feels compares to his “broken heart that will never heal.”
Credit: Courtesy of Melissa Callahan
With support from his family and Katelyn’s family, Cherry has soldiered on.
He was determined to graduate from the same university where he and Katelyn had planned so much of their future, an accomplishment he's set to achieve in December.
Katelyn’s dream of graduating came true as well. Late last year, OSU awarded her an honorary nursing degree, which Cherry and Katelyn’s sister-in-law accepted on her behalf.
Melissa is grateful for the support they’ve received from Victims of Impaired Drivers (VOID) and Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), organizations that push for stricter DUI legislation.
The grieving mom also cherishes signs she feels only her daughter could be behind, including a remembrance lantern that has flickered even when it’s been turned off.
“We know it's Kate turning it on just to tell us, ‘Hey, I'm here. I'm okay. I'm here visiting,’ ” says Melissa.
Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.
Meanwhile, Katelyn’s twin brother Aaron recalls seeing the words, "Forever, twin," as a train car sped by while he was struggling to finish college after her death.
“I was like, ‘Okay, that's what I needed,’ ” Aaron recalls, “and I graduated a month later.”
For Cherry, there will be no forgetting the feeling of Katelyn’s presence that he says helped him during those dire weeks in the hospital.
“She stayed,” he says. “And somehow — through the pain, through the darkness, through every mile of that long road back — she kept bringing me home.”
Read the full article here
