SPRING WILDFIRES
- LAS VEGAS, N.M. (AP) — Dangerous, gusty winds are expected to continue across northeast New Mexico into Monday. That's likely to complicate the fight against wildfires that threaten thousands of homes in mountainous rural communities. Firefighters have been able to stop the fire from spreading eastward toward Las Vegas, New Mexico, the area's largest city with 13,000 people. But the northern and southern ends of the flames are proving trickier to contain. Wind gusts have topped 50 miles per hour and are keeping some firefighting aircraft on the ground. The fires now cover 275 square miles. That's more than twice the size of Philadelphia.
RURAL ARIZONA-VACCINATIONS
- PHOENIX (AP) — In a pandemic that has seen sharp divides between urban and rural vaccination rates nationwide, Arizona is the only state where rural vaccine rates outpaced more populated counties according to a recent report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Public health experts believe the unexpected trend was mainly fueled by a group that lost a disproportionate number of lives to COVID-19: Native Americans. The devastating loss — particularly of elders — drove pushing vaccination as an act of selflessness. Arizona's own data did not include vaccinations conducted through the Indian Health Service, a federal agency. But the CDC's did.
POLICE SHOOTING-NEW MEXICO
- HOBBS, N.M. (AP) — A woman who reportedly stole a police vehicle after the man she was with engaged in a shootout with Hobbs police in February has been arrested. Police looking for 28-year-old Janessa Perez went to a Hobbs home Friday afternoon and saw her peeking out the back door. Officers surrounded the house and she surrendered. Officers have been looking for Perez since Feb. 23. That's when a man in a vehicle police thought was stranded ran away and exchanged gunfire with officers. The man was killed and an officer was wounded. Perez escaped in a police vehicle, crashed it and had been on the run ever since.