AT ABOUT 10:30 A.M. on October 10, Governor Fife Symington’s press secretary, Doug Cole, appeared in the Senate press room and began handing reporters a brief statement. The release contained some shocking news: At 10 p.m. the previous evening, Department of Public Safety Director Rick Ayars and his hand-picked deputy,…

ON THE MORNING of his release from jail, erstwhile murder suspect Mike McGraw blinks in the broad sunlight and lowers his thick body into the shotgun seat. He tosses a plastic bag full of personal effects into the back seat. He’s about to take a trip to Wat Promkunaram. He…

In April, when Muin M. Kalla left his job as planning director for the Town of Paradise Valley, town manager John Baudek praised him as a model employee. Kalla’s leaving was marked by a “resolution of appreciation” issued by the Paradise Valley Town Council for the dozen years in which…