Roswell Daily Record
Vol. 121, No. 161 75¢ Daily / $1.25 Sunday
INSIDE NEWS
SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Fourth of July fireworks show went off with a bang over San Diego Bay. Too big a bang. The Big Bay Boom show that was supposed to wow crowds for 20 minutes lasted only about 20 seconds after a computer mishap caused multiple bulb-shaped explosions on the bay, lighting the night sky over downtown San Diego and filling the air with deafening booms. - PAGE A3
July 6, 2012
FRIDAY
Hiring outlook improves; economy weak
WASHINGTON (AP) — The outlook for the U.S. job market brightened a little Thursday after the government said fewer people applied for unemployment benefits last week and surveys of private companies showed hiring increased in June.
BIG BAY FIZZLE
THE VOICE OF THE PECOS VALLEY
The economy is still far from healthy. U.S. service companies grew more slowly last month. Retail sales figures were disappointing. And central banks in
Splash dunk
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Europe and China cut their interest rates, an indication that they expect weaker growth ahead.
But despite all the gloom, American factories and service firms kept hiring in June. Economists say that suggests many companies are less worried that the spring slump will endure. Wall Street was mixed in light of the latest economic reports. Stocks fell early but recovered much of their losses by midday. Bad
news from Europe was offset by higher expectations for June job growth, which the government will report on Friday. The economy added an average of just 73,000 jobs a month in April and May. That’s much lower than the 226,000 a month that were added in the first three months of the year. And it’s far too low to reduce the unemployment rate, which See ECONOMY, Page A6
AP Photo
Mitt to open 4 in NM
A shopper walks the aisles of a Chicago Target store on Thursday.
ALBUQUERQUE (AP) — The Romney campaign is set to begin its push in New Mexico with four new offices throughout the state as it races to catch up with the Obama operation, the Republican National Committee announced Thursday.
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INSIDE SPORTS Mark Wilson Photo
Kids from the Family Resource & Referral’s After School Program beat the heat with a basketball game in the swimming pool at Cahoon Park, Thursday afternoon.
Rick Wiley, national political director of the Republican National Committee, said that the GOP is launching an aggressive effort this weekend to identify potential voters and recruit New Mexico volunteers, especially bilingual ones. Wiley said the New Mexico efforts are part of a national push Saturday across the country aimed at promoting newly anointed offices.
Midwest gets no relief New jobs report looms over from oppressive heat
BACK IN FINALS
WIMBLEDON, England (AP) — Serena Williams wins with so much more than serving, of course. Her groundstrokes are intimidating. Her superb speed and anticipation fuel unparalleled court-covering defense. Her returns are outstanding, too. When that serve is on-target, though, it sure is something special, quite possibly the greatest in the history of women’s tennis. Lashing a tournament-record 24 aces at up to 120 mph, and doing plenty of other things well, too, four-time ... - PAGE B1
TODAY’S • • • •
OBITUARIES
Deborah Jo White Hector Omero Castillo Kenetha Diehl Jimmy L. Estrada - PAGE A7
HIGH ...95˚ LOW ....68˚
TODAY’S FORECAST
CLASSIFIEDS..........B5 COMICS.................B3 FINANCIAL .............B4 GENERAL ..............A2 HOROSCOPES ........A8 LOTTERIES ............A2 OPINION ................A4 SPORTS ................B1 WEATHER ..............A8 THE WEST ............A3
INDEX
MILWAUKEE (AP) — The temperatures in Casimir Brandon’s basement bedroom grew so stifling that the exhausted Madison man began riding city buses in the morning, from one end of the line to the other, so he could grab a few hours of air -conditioned sleep. Brandon is among those searching for any kind of relief as oppressive heat slams the middle of the country with record temperatures that aren’t going away after the sun goes down. So when the city of Madison transfor med a vacant convention center into a 24-hour cooling center, Brandon jumped at the chance to sleep in comfort. “I had a cot there, but I gave it up to a lady who had a kid,” said Brandon, 56. “But it’s OK. I just lined up six chairs and slept like a baby. I was just so tired from the previous two days that it wasn’t a problem at all.” St. Louis, Milwaukee,
Minneapolis, Chicago and several other Midwest cities already have set record highs this week or are on the verge of doing so. And with even low temperatures setting heat records, residents are left searching for any relief. The National Weather Service issued excessiveheat warnings Thursday for all of Illinois and Indiana, as well as parts of Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Missouri, Kentucky, Ohio and Michigan. Forecasts called for daytime temperatures from the mid- to high 90s into the low 100s. St. Louis hit a record high of 105 on Wednesday and a record low of 83. In Wisconsin, the coolest Milwaukee and Madison got was 81 in the early morning, beating previous low records by 2 and 4 degrees respectively. Temperatures didn’t fall below 79 in Chicago, 78 in Grand Rapids, Mich., and 75 in
JESSICA PALMER RECORD STAFF WRITER
from out of town, only Marcantel was willing to be named. For the purposes of this article, the remainder will be referred to by their occupations. These include an undercover agent with the Chaves County Metro Gang Task Force, a student who grew up in gang territory and a criminologist who made a specific study of the local gangs.
See MITT, Page A6
Obama campaign bus trip SANDUSKY, Ohio (AP) — Campaigning by bus through swing state Ohio, President Barack Obama cast his re-election bid as a bet on the American worker Thursday, even as he braced for a Friday unemployment report that will help set battle lines for the hot summer to come. The monthly unemployment numbers could alter or harden voters’ views of Obama’s core re-election argument that he pulled the U.S. back from recession while Republican Mitt Romney embraces policies that led to an economic near-collapse. A weak report could undermine Obama’s position, while improvement could help the president — though concerns about jobs are sure to a major issue through Election Day. Obama tellingly chose to start his summer of
AP Photo
President Barack Obama talks with child at Ziggy’s Pub and Restaurant in Amherst, Ohio, Thursday.
on-the-road campaigning in two political battleground states that have a rosier economic outlook than some parts of the nation. Both Ohio and Pennsylvania had unem-
ployment rates of 7.3 percent in May, well below the national average of 8.2 percent. “This is how summer is
Only 3 ways to get out of gangs: Death, prison, injury
Part 1 of 3 Gangs are fact of life. The numbers appear intimidating until one views the national average. “We have 250 gangs with 78,000 members statewide. This is compared to 33,000 gangs and 1.4 million members nationwide,” said Tamara Marcantel with the New Mexico Gang Task Force in Santa Fe. Of the four people interviewed, three local and one
See HEAT, Page A6
The police agent reported that local gangs are neither as organized nor as competitive as gangs elsewhere. “Guys from the Eastside
gang will attend parties with people from Westside or Southside. It’s not like California, where a member of a gang can be shot for walking down the street in rival territory.”
The student, who grew up in the Eastside gang territory, disagreed. He said as he showed the gang sign, “You could get shot if you didn’t give the right sign.”
He spoke of intimidation and pointed to a map of Roswell. “This is Barria Fruta, and there used to be
quite a few shoot-outs here between them and the Eastside (Chihuahuita) gang.
The criminologist supported the student’s statement. “Some kids have to join a gang for their own safety.
Marcantel acknowledged that New Mexico gangs fought turf wars and often competed in criminal activities. However, she concurred with the local agent, saying they did not have the hard-and-fast hierarchy found in gangs elsewhere.
See OBAMA, Page A6
The criminologist presented another perspective. “These guys are not dumb. They are organized and do have a certain hierarchy. If you want to know who is in charge, you got to ask, ‘Who has the keys?’”
The police agent said the vendettas and drive-by shootings were not associated with gangs, but tended to be more personal, familial revenge reminiscent of the Hatfields and McCoys. According to the See GANGS, Page A6