A Yazoo City father of three died early Saturday after he was thrown from the back seat of a car that swerved to avoid a deer on U.S. 61 North, overturning near Redwood.

Three other people in that car and two others in a vehicle that also flipped as the driver attempted to avoid the first wreck also were injured, Warren County Sheriff Martin Pace said.

Both wrecks were reported just after midnight.

Melvin James Baker, 21, 8673 Scotland Road, was one of three passengers in the 2006 Chevrolet Impala traveling north on the four-lane highway when the driver, Herman L. Ketchson, 22, of Yazoo City, swerved to avoid a deer, Mississippi Highway Safety Patrol spokesman Cpl. Odis Easterling said. The car flipped and landed upside down in the northbound lane of the highway.

Baker, who was not wearing a seat belt, landed in a ditch about 25 feet from where the car came to a stop, Pace said

Warren County Coroner Doug Huskey pronounced Baker dead at the scene from trauma to the head and chest.

The other two passengers, Saquaneria Collum, 19, and Krystal Davis, 22, also both of Yazoo City, and Ketchson were taken to River Region Medical Center. None was listed at the hospital late Saturday.

Seconds after the first wreck, a second northbound vehicle swerved to avoid the crash and the driver lost control, overturning that vehicle, too, before it came to rest on the east side of the road, Pace said. Both people in the sedan, whose names were unavailable, also were taken by ambulance to the hospital.

“This accident is just another tragic example of the importance of wearing your seat belt,” Pace said. “Accidents cannot be predicted, and once the accident happens, it’s too late.”

Baker, a native of Yazoo City and 2009 graduate of Yazoo County High School, worked for Nissan in Canton.

“He was a good-hearted person,” said his mother, Bertha Moton.

“He liked to ride horses, and he loved his family,” she said. “He loved his three babies.”

Family friend Shondra Matthews of Yazoo City said she had known Baker all his life and described him as easily “making other people laugh.”

The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks reported last week that deer movement in Warren County and the area is unusually high for this time of year.

Biologists said dry weather and a high deer fly population are forcing the animals to move so they can find food and are not easy targets for the pesky insects.

Funeral services for Baker are pending at Knight and Lindsey Funeral Home in Yazoo City.

Baker’s death was the sixth fatal wreck in Warren County this year.