ACCIDENTS LEAVE FIVE DEAD

Three separate motor vehicle accidents Friday and Saturday resulted in the deaths of five area residents.

The accidents took place over a six-hour period in Scott and Cape Girardeau counties.

The first incident occurred at 6:47 p.m. Friday on Route M, two miles east of Chaffee.

According to the Missouri Highway Patrol, Perry Gregory, 44, of Dexter was traveling east on Route M when his vehicle crossed the center line and struck head on an oncoming vehicle driven by Tracey Holder, 29, of Scott City.

Gregory died shortly after the collision while Holder was taken to St. Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau with serious injuries. Holder died Saturday morning.

The second incident, which occurred at 12:30 a.m. Saturday in Cape Girardeau County, also resulted in two fatalities.

The patrol said Robert Welker, 44, of Marble Hill failed to negotiated a curve while driving his pickup truck north on Route OO two miles south of Bufordville.

The vehicle ran off the roadway and struck a tree, killing Welker and a passenger, Kevin Brewington, 40, of Marquand.

In the third incident, a Cape Girardeau man was killed following a four-vehicle accident on Interstate 55, just south of the Nash Road exit in Scott County.

According to Cape Girardeau police, the accident occurred at 12:45 a.m. Saturday when a vehicle traveling north in the southbound lanes of I-55 collided head on with a vehicle driven by Edward Dwayne Brumagin, 32, of Cape Girardeau.

Brumagin was taken to Southeast Missouri Hospital in Cape Girardeau where he was pronounced dead 11 hours later.

A passenger in Brumagin's vehicle, William Millner, 25, of Charleston, was also taken to Southeast Missouri Hospital. He was treated and released.

The drivers of two other southbound vehicles were unable to stop in time to avoid striking the first two vehicles. Those drivers -- Rolanda Harris, 44, and Carla Ford, 24, both of Kansas City -- suffered only minor injuries.

A 27-year-old Charleston man driving the vehicle that collided with Brumagin was taken into custody and released by the authority of the Scott County prosecuting attorney's office pending further investigation. Authorities would not release the man's name.