Less than two years after a court ordered Phoenix to allow gun-rights activists to plaster city bus shelters with the slogan “Guns Save Lives,” officials have once again attempted to censor advertisements containing the emotionally charged phrase. The new ads, much like the signs that sparked a four-year legal battle…
Check yourself before you start cursing at that out-of-town driver. Arizona drivers are among the worst in the nation, according to a new analysis of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics conducted by the website CarInsuranceComparison.com. The state ranked sixth for most-dangerous drivers in 2015 after Montana, South Carolina, New…
A group of five condemned prisoners this week asked the U.S. District Court in Phoenix not to lift a moratorium on executions instituted after a botched 2014 lethal injection, arguing that the Arizona Department of Corrections has not properly addressed concerns about the drugs used for the procedure. A federal…
With the gun culture going strong here in the desert, it’s not hard to believe that Arizona is ranked the eighth most-dangerous state in the country.But there’s more to it than that. To calculate the measure of which states are most dangerous, the data crunchers at the personal finance website…
Arguing that current efforts to stop Mexican drug cartels from packing heroin over Arizona’s border have “fallen short,” Governor Doug Ducey today appealed to federal officials for financial and technical support for a controversial new border security force made up of state police. Since September, when Ducey quietly assembled the…
The name of each transgender murder victim was read in somber tones: Lamia Beard, Virginia. Keyshia Blige, Illinois. Kandis Capri, Arizona. Some in the crowd of about 50 that gathered on the Arizona State Capitol lawn to commemorate their lives Friday, which was Transgender Day of Remembrance, dabbed at tears…
It seems all those years on the bottom of the education-funding heap are finally paying off; Arizona now is the 10th stupidest state in the country. This flattering fact is brought to you by Donald Trump, who, after discovering Iowa polls showed Ben Carson had nearly tied him in the…
Phoenix photographer Andrew Pielage went to Paris expecting to fill his memory card with beautiful shots of sparkling stained-glass windows, magnificently manicured gardens, and the Eiffel Tower. But when terrorists shot up a sports stadium, a rock concert, and a string of cafes and bars Friday, killing at least 129…
Rosa Robles Loreto packed one pair of pajamas, one pair of shoes, two pairs of pants, and four blouses into a small, black suitcase. She decided she could do without her hair dryer and the bulky pot of face cream she usually slathered on before bed as she eyed the…
A crowd of Phoenicians chanting “We reject racism!” descended on Governor Doug Ducey’s office today after he pledged to resist President Barack Obama’s plans to resettle thousands of refugees in Arizona over the next year. “We can not sit idly in our offices safe and sound while xenophobia and racism…
Masked protesters marched up and down Camelback Road waving shredded American flags, shouting expletives, and flipping off passing drivers as part of a worldwide show of discontent organized by hacktivist collective Anonymous. Phoenix authorities warned nearby businesses of possible violence and a squad of bicycle-mounted police officers hovered nearby, but…
The menacing online poster who threatened to shoot up Arizona State University with an assault rifle Monday is a 12-year-old boy in Canada, law enforcement officials announced today. The boy has “apologized for his actions and the disruption they caused,” according to an ASU police statement. He has been contacted…
A giant jack-o-lantern with hollow black eyes and a menacing grin is tumbling through the streets, bouncing off vans, knocking down street lights, and bowling into pedestrians. It may sound like a scene out of a bad horror film, but it actually happened in Arizona Thursday when a 25-foot tall, 350-pound…
The percentage of Arizona children who don’t have health insurance is shrinking, but, for the fifth year in a row, the state remains among the worst in the nation for access to care, according to a new report from Georgetown University. Ten percent of Arizona children were uninsured in 2014,…
More than a year after the use of an experimental-drug cocktail left an inmate gasping on the executioner’s gurney for nearly two hours, the Arizona Department of Corrections has revised its lethal-injection protocols — but prisoner advocates say the changes won’t fix the problem. When Joseph Wood was put to death…
Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication is lobbying to get its namesake’s face on a postage stamp. Christopher Callahan, the school’s dean, started organizing a letter-writing campaign after the U.S. Postal Service announced last week that it is considering a proposal, submitted by the Society…
The word “alien” is a technical term defined by Merriam-Webster as “relating, belonging, or owing allegiance to another country or government.” But U.S. Representative Ruben Gallego says it’s “dehumanizing and offensive.” He recently signed on to co-sponsor a bill, introduced by Congressman Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), that would strike the word…
Federal inspectors charged with investigating allegations of abuse in immigrant detention centers appear to be helping to perpetuate it, a new report states. The report released Wednesday by the National Immigrant Justice Center and the Detention Watch Network, follows months of protests from immigrant-rights activists over the death of 31-year-old Mexican…
An Arizona nonprofit dedicated to protecting a herd of horses that runs free along the Salt River has dropped a lawsuit that aimed to block the U.S. Forest Service from rounding up and auctioning off the animals. Simone Netherlands, president of the Salt River Wild Horse Management Group, said it…
History got a little too real in Tombstone, when a man reenacting a gunfight fired live bullets, shooting a fellow actor in the thigh and spraying shrapnel into the crowd. The actors, who perform with The Tombstone Vigilantes, a troupe that recreates Old West shootouts several times a month in…
A U.S. Border Patrol agent stopped a motorist on Highway 95, 75 miles from Mexico. When the man refused to consent to a search, the officer kicked a dent in the man’s car while four of his colleagues surrounded the driver with weapons drawn, forced him to the ground, and…
It takes a saguaro cactus about 75 years to achieve its iconic, armed stature. It takes a couple burly poachers about 30 minutes to steal it. “They just wrap it in carpet to protect themselves from the spines, then they dig up its roots and heft it into a truck,”…
