Lori Romaneck says she felt sure of something when she stepped into the Phoenix Police Department on June 9, 1993. “I thought they’d make sure I wasn’t totally nuts,” she recalls, “then they’d go dig up Mother. Simple.” The Phoenix woman, then 32, had kept an enormous secret for more…
The townsfolk of Christopher Creek, a hamlet in the Mogollon Rim country, first spotted the young elk last year. Residents of the Gila County village say they’re used to seeing wildlife in the forests surrounding their homes, but never had an animal so captivated them. Nicknamed “Spike” by a local…
Senator John Kaites really ought to run for sheriff. The Deputy Dawg of Arizona politics has successfully sponsored a piece of legislation even more brilliant than his failed attempt to have new mothers drug-tested (by testing the umbilical cord–and I’m not making this up). On May 29, Governor Jane Hull…
Let’s get one thing straight. Barring the discovery that she had a tryst with Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky–and Linda Tripp got to watch–Jane Dee Hull will be reelected. By a wide margin. It’s a no-brainer. The economy’s good, the opposition’s weak and, after Fife Symington, Jane Hull looks like…
Is That a Banana in Your Pocket or Just a U.S. Senator? Senator John McCain is promoting the Spur Cross public land swindle in Scottsdale for a pal of his from Cincinnati–the wealthy manager of Chiquita bananas. Amy Silverman points out that Mr. Chiquita is a major contributor to U.S…
1956–Gene Keidel and DiAnne Kidder marry in Peoria, Illinois. September 17, 1966–The last time DiAnne Keidel is seen alive. January 9, 1967–Fire at the Citrus Way home kills two of the Keidel children and seriously injures a third. January 10, 1967–Police investigator concludes that the fire had started accidentally on…
In May 1995, Lori Romaneck asked a clerk at the state’s Office of Vital Records for copies of two death certificates. “I wanted to bury my two sisters with my mother, and I needed the right paperwork,” she says. “That was it.” But at that moment, Romaneck saw something that…
George A. Hormel II went on a shopping spree in 1992. With a $13 million inheritance in his pocket, Hormel, whom everyone calls “Geordie,” had been lured from Los Angeles to buy the 57,000-square-foot McCune Mansion in Paradise Valley. Phoenix-area real estate values were still in the dumper, and, at…
1956–Gene Keidel and DiAnne Kidder married in Peoria, Illinois. September 17, 1966–The last time DiAnne Keidel is seen alive. January 9, 1967–Fire at the Citrus Way home kills two of the Keidel children and seriously injures a third. January 10, 1967–Police investigator concludes that the fire had started accidentally on…
Karen Hayward has been trying for years to get her ex-husband to pay overdue child support. She thought she’d finally succeeded when the Maricopa County Superior Court ordered him to pay up or be arrested in June. Hayward even had the help of the Arizona Attorney General’s Office to collect…
The young man lies dead at the end of the room. I can’t stop looking at him. He’s lying in an open casket in front of the altar in the church. His face is unmarked. The bullet that killed him tore into his chest. Although the face is intact, something…
Raising — Arizona Style “VisionQuest and Boys Ranch claim lower recidivism rates for kids. . . . Studies . . . seem to bear them out.” This one paragraph in your article (“Business AZ Usual,” Chris Farnsworth, August 6) says it all. These are children who will be murdering, raping,…
In 1996, a developer and the ranch’s owners announced plans to build a golf course and a residential/hotel development at Spur Cross Ranch. Because the ranch holds significant Hohokam Indian ruins and a rare riparian area, preservationists and environmentalists were alarmed. Cave Creek annexed Spur Cross and additional land, bringing…
Almost 200 people are gathered at Scottsdale City Hall on a mid-July afternoon for what Mayor Sam Campana blissfully has dubbed an “information workshop” on the city’s latest conundrum: the proposed Spur Cross Ranch land exchange. Spur Cross Ranch is not actually in Scottsdale, but the proposed trade that would…
The video opens with shots of a choir: well-groomed young men singing “Silent Night” to a group of senior citizens. Then the image cuts to cops arresting kids. Cut back to the chorus, voices raised in song. Cut back to a cop confiscating an ugly-looking gun. Baseball celebrity Joe Garagiola…
Bidwill Hunting While his father, Arizona Cardinals owner Bill Bidwill, faces pressure to fork over big bucks to sign rookie defensive back Andre Wadsworth, Patrick Bidwill has apparently dug into his cash reserves in his own preseason holdout drama. The younger Bidwill faced the distasteful chore of defending himself against…
A Black Canyon City woman says the Baptist Foundation of Arizona (BFA) is refusing to return her life savings, even though she needs the money to pay mounting medical bills. Annette Earl, 60, claims that a BFA representative “misled” her in April 1997 when she invested $99,000 with the Arizona…
Porn Free Although the article on porn star Nikki Lynn and husband Richard (“The Best Laid Plans of Nikki Lynn,” Brian Smith, July 30) portrayed them as “just folks” and loving members of a happy family, the description of the families in which they grew up is quite enlightening: Nikki’s…
When she opens the door, her life is written on her face. The bruises around her eyes. The off-white, puffy skin. The frightened look, which she tries and fails to hide with her forced cheerfulness. Her name is Judy. She lives in a motel on Grand Avenue. It’s the kind…
Picture the setup for a girl-on-girl tryst in a porn nugget titled Hot Seats released last summer on VCA video: Horny babes on mountain bikes traversing the hills outside of Los Angeles, clad in tight bike shorts, nipple-enhancing jerseys and enough makeup to challenge any Spice Girl. Two of them…
All week long, people had been telling me upbeat things about Globe. What a small, welcoming and crimeless community it is–congenial to families, kids, retirees and everyone in between. How cool the summer air is in the evenings. How close it is to other worlds. The San Carlos Apache Reservation,…
Last week, state treasurer Tony West got caught in the Web when the dailies reported he was pimping his corporation commission campaign on his state-sponsored treasurer’s office Internet site. The offending statement–“Treasurer West is running for election to the Corporation Commission this year. Click here to visit his campaign web…
