The names of at least three people wanting to be Cape Girardeau County's next coroner will appear on the August primary ballot now that two more candidates have entered the race.

Meanwhile, current Cape County Coroner John Clifton told the Missourian Friday he will not seek election to a fifth four-year term and intends to retire from the office at the end of the year.

"It's time," said Clifton, 75, who has served as the county's coroner since 2004.

Clifton's chief deputy, Dennis Turner, submitted his candidacy documents Wednesday with county election officials, and on Thursday K. Gerald "Jerry" Swan, who has also served as a chief deputy coroner in Cape Girardeau County, followed suit.

Both Turner and Swan have filed as Republicans as has Wavis Jordan, interim pastor of Hobbs Chapel and president of the SEMO Pachyderm Club, who filed for the race Jan. 25, the first day of the candidate filing period.

Jordan, Turner and Swan -- as well as anyone else who files as a Republican for the coroner's position -- will be listed on the Republican ballot in the Aug. 4 primary election leading up to the Nov. 3 general election.

No Democratic candidate has filed for the coroner's post -- or any other elective position in Cape Girardeau County -- to date.

Turner, a resident of Oak Ridge, Missouri, began working with Clifton and the coroner's office in 2005. He and his wife then spent several years in the Hannibal, Missouri, area where he was elected coroner of Ralls County, serving a four-year term in that position from 2009-2012.

A retired police detective from the Cleveland area, Turner returned to Cape Girardeau County following his term as the Ralls County coroner and resumed his work with the Cape Girardeau Coroner's Office.

Swan, a Cape Girardeau native and resident of Jackson, studied mortuary science at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and has been in the funeral business since 1992. He has been a licensed mortician for 25 years in Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois, most recently with McCombs Funeral Home, and served as chief deputy under former Cape Girardeau County Coroner John Carpenter in the 1990s.

Swan currently works with the public safety department at Southeast Missouri State University.

The coroner's 2020 salary is set at $45,779.76, according to Cape Girardeau County Clerk Kara Clark Summers.

The filing period for the county's Aug. 4 primary election runs through March 31.

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