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Thursday night, Albuquerque police identified the man killed in a shootout at a west side Motel 6 with former CNN reporter Chuck de Caro as 27-year-old Tomorio Walton, who APD says is an absconder out of Memphis, Tennessee. APD spokesperson Tanner Tixier said it is unknown how long Walton had been in the Albuquerque area.

SANTA FE – Dr. Roy G. Heilbron, 51, a self-described “holistic” cardiologist in Santa Fe, has been charged with health care fraud and wire fraud in a 24-count federal indictment. The indictment, announced Wednesday by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Albuquerque, alleges that Heilbron executed a scheme to defraud Medicare and other health care benefit programs from January 2010 to May 2011 by submitting false and fraudulent claims. Heilbron entered a not-guilty plea in federal court Wednesday and was released on his own recognizance. His medical license had been suspended by the New Mexico Medical Board for three months last...

TEXAS -- A giant redheaded centipede was found crawling on a broom in a park in Texas. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department posted a photo of the insect on Twitter. The centipede was discovered at Garner State Park in Uvalde County in the Hill Country. This is one scary looking insect. In the wild, it can grow to be 8 inches long with a brightly colored body and legs. Officials at the University of Arkansas Arthropod Museum describe this species of centipede as "fast moving and aggressive titans." The giant redheaded centipede is a predator that primarily feeds on...

An abortion rights activist stole the signs of a pro-life group and then threw them over the highway overpass where the demonstration was held. Members of Protest ABQ were attacked on Wednesday, July 1, 2015 in Albuquerque, NM while conducting a peaceful overpass demonstration to educate the public about abortion. The group uses posters of the abortion victims to show what abortion does to the unborn child in the womb. “Protest ABQ conducts weekly overpass protests to peacefully expose the violence that abortion inflicts on pre-born children in the womb,” Bud Shaver, Executive Director of Protest ABQ told Life Dynamics....

A road trip down old Route 66 led to a Wild West-style motel shootout for a pioneering CNN anchor and her former-soldier hubby. Lynne Russell — the first woman to ever solo-anchor a primetime network news show — and Chuck de Caro, 65, had stopped at a Motel 6 for the night in Albuquerque when an intruder slipped into their room as Russell went to grab something from the car around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. “I opened the door and he materialized out of nowhere; he was inside,” she told The Post. “And he pushed me into the room and onto...

One Boy Scout died and three others were rescued after being swept away in a flash flood early Saturday, according to the New Mexico State Police. A group of eight Scouts, ages 14 to 17, three crew leaders and one adult ranger were on the two-week trek across the Philmont Scout Ranch, a popular Boy Scout ranch near Cimarron. They were camped near the North Ponil Canyon, 15 miles northeast of the training center. Rain started falling early Saturday morning, flooding parts of the ranch property, according to a news release posted on the ranch’s website. Around 4:30 a.m. Saturday,...

Albuquerque police say a Domino's delivery driver shot an armed man who attempted to rob him in the restaurant's parking lot in the North Valley late Sunday. Police responded to the scene near Menaul and 12th around 9:30 p.m. Sunday. Officers received reports of a robbery in progress and shots being fired in the area.

To keep conservative rebels in check, Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his allies have been doling out punishments at an aggressive clip in the 114th Congress. From kicking unruly members off the Rules Committee and GOP whip team to stripping a lawmaker of his subcommittee gavel, leadership has been growing more comfortable with taking retaliatory measures to try to enforce party discipline. But several Tea Party targets haven’t gone quietly. They’ve been fighting back with help from Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan’s conservative House Freedom Caucus, which successfully pressured leaders this week to return a subcommittee gavel to one of their...

New research has revealed why it took more than 30 million years for large Triassic dinosaurs to populate the tropics after they first appeared on Earth, ending a mystery that has kept researchers baffled for decades. Using new geological evidence culled from Ghost Ranch, N.M., researchers from the University of Southampton in the U.K. have found that an extremely unpredictable hot and arid climate due to elevated carbon dioxide levels (four to six times of what they are today) kept large herbivorous dinos at bay until after 200 million years ago.

LAS CRUCES, N.M. -- Court records indicate sensitive personal data for an unknown number of Doña Ana County voters — particularly those ages 19 or 20 — was compromised in a binational identity theft and check-cashing scam allegedly spearheaded locally by a county clerk's office document technician. Maria Ceniceros, 42, of Anthony, New Mexico, admitted to federal agents that she'd picked through the Doña Ana County voter registration database records on her work computer to glean "names, birthdates, and Social Security numbers" to supply to scam organizers in Mexico, according to court records. Federal authorities believe the data was then...

Fifty-three years ago, when newly elected Dwight Eisenhower moved into the White House, America's southern frontier was as porous as a spaghetti sieve. As many as 3 million illegal migrants had walked and waded northward over a period of several years for jobs in California, Arizona, Texas, and points beyond. President Eisenhower cut off this illegal traffic. He did it quickly and decisively with only 1,075 United States Border Patrol agents – less than one-tenth of today's force. Years later, the late Herbert Brownell Jr., Eisenhower's first attorney general, said in an interview with this writer that the president had...

A group of Albuquerque bikers came to 5-year-old Albuquerque girl’s rescue this week. The girl who was bullied on her way home from school got an unexpected visit by the Punishers. They’re loud, big, burly bikers dressed in black. While the men may appear dark and dangerous, the Punishers, a law enforcement motorcycle club in Albuquerque are far from it. “We are all pretty soft hearted. I’m actually a nurse,” said Punishers LE/MC Albuquerque President Norman Gonzalez. This week the group, made up of military veterans and former police officers, banded together with local self-defense group Shockwave to help a...

The Chechen parliament have threatened to send weapons to Mexico in retaliation to the U.S. Congress calling for defensive lethal aid to be sent to Ukraine. On Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly in favour of sending arms - the resolution was passed 348 to 48. U.S. senator for Wisconsin Ron Johnson branded it "absolutely necessary" that president Obama provide lethal and nonlethal military assistance to Ukraine, in light of the attacks by Russian-backed rebels on civilians in Mariupol in January. In response, Chechnya's parliamentary speaker Dukuvakha Abdurakhmanov said that the U.S. has "no right" to advise Russia...

Rio Rancho Police Chief Michael Geier detailed the last moments of Officer Gregg Benner's shift during a news conference Tuesday in which police identified a known gang member with an extensive criminal record that included a manslaughter conviction and weapons charges as the man suspected of fatally shooting the officer. Andrew Romero, 28, was a passenger in the vehicle that Benner attempted to stop just after 8 p.m. Monday near a fast-food restaurant, Geier said. "It started out as, for all practical purposes, a routine traffic stop, something our officers do daily," the chief said. "Officer Benner is a hardworking,...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Rio Rancho police have identified the officer killed in the line of duty and the suspect accused of shooting him on Memorial Day. Just after 8 p.m. Monday, officer Gregg "Nigel" Benner was shot during a traffic stop near Southern Boulevard and Pinetree Road in Rio Rancho. He later died at UNM Hospital, the department confirmed early Tuesday. Benner, 49, was a four-year veteran of the department and a married father of five adult children. He was also an Air Force veteran. "Officer Benner was a dedicated military veteran and law enforcement officer and his tragic death is deeply saddening...

President Obama can flex his presidential power issuing Executive Orders regarding immigration. I propose the most urgent presidential mandate should be to build a border wall. As an immigration attorney based in California, I would benefit from the government ignoring the border and creating millions of new clients for my firm. But as an American, I want the Government to protect our soil and my family from threats coming across our southern border. Drug mules and Islamic State terrorists should not be able to waltz into the US. Therefore I have drafted a proposal, and an effectively free funding plan,...

An investigative author from New Mexico with a history of scientifically debunking the chupacabra myth says he can explain sightings of the mythical creature. "When you do DNA testing on these alleged chupacabras, they're known animals," Benjamin Radford, who authored the 2011 book "Tracking the Chupacabra," told New Mexico television station KOB. "They are coyotes or dogs. In some cases, they're raccoons. The hairlessness can be explained by a disease called sarcoptic mange, which is caused by skin mites." Animals with advanced mange often die when exposed to cold, but because of warmer temperatures brought on by climate change, those...

On my way to the NRA annual meeting, I passed through Lordburg, New Mexico on I-10. It is a convenient place to fuel the truck and myself, so I pulled into a truck stop to grab a sandwich. Open carry is protected by the New Mexico Constitution. I was carrying a Glock 17 (9mm for those who have not kept up with Glock nomenclature). The young woman behind the counter had a streak of purple hair, multiple piercings, a sizable tattoo on her right forearm, and was friendly, courteous, helpful, efficient and pleasant to speak with. I could not ask...

The New Mexico Law Review is devoting its entire spring issue to eight contemporary legal issues – as seen through the entertaining but nonetheless very serious lens of a “Breaking Bad” perspective. Eight articles and essays include analyses of criminal procedure, a hypothetical arrest of Walter White, attorney-client communications, police practices, the war on drugs, and morality and the law. The Law Review, edited by University of New Mexico School of Law students, is due out Friday. An electronic version already has been posted online at lawschool.unm.edu/nmlr/current-issue.php. The Law Review’s faculty adviser, Professor Dave Sidhu, described the issue as creative...

Twenty-seven senators want President Obama to block federal agencies and contractors from asking job applicants about prior criminal convictions. The senators, including 26 Democrats and presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), want Obama to take executive action to "ban the box," referring to a question on job applications that asks if an applicant has any convictions. "We ask you to require federal contractors and agencies to refrain from asking job applicants about prior convictions until later in the hiring process," they said in a letter to Obama on Monday. "This policy would eliminate unnecessary barriers to employment for all job...