MARTIN, MI (WHTC-AM/FM) – The identities of the two drivers involved in a fatal head-on crash on US-131 near Martin over the weekend have been disclosed.
Allegan County Sheriff’s Deputies and Gun Lake Tribal Police Officers were dispatched shortly after 12 Midnight on Sunday, following a report of a vehicle driving south in the northbound lanes of the freeway near the Gun Lake Casino Resort. They were able to spot a speeding Suburu Legacy near the 129th Avenue junction in Bradley, and while law enforcement was attempting to catch up, the vehicle slammed into a northbound Ford Fusion two miles further south.
As a result of the crash, 38-year-old Erin Louise Jones of Grand Rapids, driving the at-fault vehicle, as well as 18-year-old Emmanuel Browning of Kalamazoo, driving the other vehicle, were killed instantly. A front seat passenger in the Fusion also perished at the scene, and a 17-year-old Portage woman, one of three other passengers in that second vehicle who was taken to an undisclosed medical facility, has since succumbed to her life-threatening injuries. Her name, as well as those of the other two injured persons, will not be disclosed by authorities.
It has been reported that two of the three teens injured were high school students from Kalamazoo County, one from Comstock High and the other from Portage Community High, while one of those who died was a 2025 graduate of Portage Northern High.
Other circumstances surrounding the incident have not, as of yet, been made public, as the collision remains under investigation by the Allegan County Crash Reconstruction Team.
-Michael Arney of WKZO-AM/FM contributed to this report
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