Ice a factor in 3 highway deaths

Icy roads were factors in three fatal crashes this week, Virginia State Police said.

A 15-year-old girl died early yesterday after a wreck in Bedford County on Wednesday.

Mariah Lynn Pitts of Lynchburg was a passenger in a pickup truck that was traveling on state Route 708, six-tenths of a mile south of U.S. 460. Police said the truck hit an ice patch, ran off the road to the right, struck a utility pole and overturned into a creek at 11:20 p.m. Pitts, who was not wearing a seat belt, died at Lynchburg General Hospital yesterday at 1:25 a.m., police said.

In Orange County, a single-car crash killed a Gordonsville man Wednesday.

Sean Kenyatta Epps, 32, was driving on state Route 621, three-tenths of a mile north of state Route 608, when the vehicle hit an icy patch on the roadway at 11:05 p.m. The driver lost control of the vehicle, which struck a ditch and overturned several times, ejecting him. Epps, who was not wearing a seat belt, died at Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg, police said.

Yesterday, a West Virginia man was killed in a crash in Bluefield.

James Oscar Mullin, 58, of Nemours, W.Va., was driving a sport utility vehicle south on South College Avenue, 475 feet south of Rollins Street, when it ran off the icy road, into a ditch and struck an embankment at 8:45 a.m. Mullin, who police said was not wearing a seat belt, was partially ejected. He died at Bluefield Regional Medical Center in Bluefield, W.Va.

Their deaths brought the number of people killed on Virginia roads this year to 53, compared with 53 as of the same date last year.