The Jeep was stopped on the railroad tracks at County Road 554, one mile east of Poplar Bluff. County Road 554 is also known as Wilcox Road in that area. Wilcox Road has been the subject of ghostly tales on the internet.

One such posting in 2007 on strangeusa.com gives directions to the Wilcox Road railroad tracks, then says: "Most people do this at midnight, but people have reported seeing spirits as early as 10 pm." The site talks about pulling onto the tracks and shutting off your car. You can hear a train whistle in the background, it says, and it gets louder, then stops. "You will often also see a light when you look down the train tracks," the legend says.

The ghostly tale claims a train derailed there in the 1900s, killing nearly everyone on board. A man was decapitated but authorities never found his head, the site claims, and a pregnant woman's body was recovered but the baby was missing from her womb.

Akers, the coroner, said he spoke with the parents of the girls in the Jeep and the survivors. What he heard was a chilling account of the teenage game.

"This is a horrible tragedy," he said. "This is some type of game going on in teenage culture in our county for years."