ELDERLY WOMAN DIES WHEN STRUCK BY CAR

An elderly Stoddard County woman died Thursday after being run over by the car she had been driving. The woman had left the car to check her mailbox, and apparently left the 1972 Mercury in gear, said authorities. It rolled forward, pinning the woman beneath the vehicle.

Bernice Martin, 78, of Highway 25, north of Dexter, died about 5 p.m. Thursday at St. Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau, a spokesman with the Missouri Highway Patrol at Poplar Bluff said. Martin was transferred there from Dexter Hospital, he said.

The accident happened at 1:30 p.m. at a private driveway off Highway 25, 1 miles north of Dexter.