Off the I-15

By now some of you may have noticed a new byline popping up in the pages of the Desert Dispatch, attached to reports of machete-wielding home invaders, scrap metal thieves and other tales of crime and punishment. That name, Abby Sewell, belongs to me. I joined the paper on March 5 as Barstow’s new cops and courts reporter.

For those of you who were wondering — no, Aaron Aupperlee has not left the paper or fled the state. He’s still alive and well and working at the Desert Dispatch. In this age of newspaper layoffs, the Dispatch was able to hire another reporter to join the small Barstow office so that Aaron can concentrate on editing.

I came to Barstow from Oregon, where I was working as a general assignment reporter at a twice-weekly paper called the Molalla Pioneer. The biggest story in Molalla centered around an ongoing legal battle over a pet deer. Before that, I lived in Portland, where I went to college and then worked odd jobs and tried to make it as a freelance writer for a couple of years before deciding to pursue a full time career as a reporter.

I had never laid eyes on Barstow before I arrived in town three weeks ago, but I’m no stranger to the desert. I grew up in Tucson, before fleeing to the greener pastures of Oregon. I liked living in Oregon — nice people, beautiful scenery, good coffee. But I also missed the desert. Nine months of rain every year starts to get to you after a while. So, when I started looking for a reporting job at a daily paper, I looked to the Southwest.

Coming from a newspaper job where I reported on pretty much everything outside of sports, the cops and court beat appealed to me. There’s always action, you get a picture of human nature at its best and worst, and people can’t complain to a crime reporter, “Why do you always write about the bad things?”

In my first couple of weeks on the job, I have found Barstow to be full of nice people and weird and interesting news. When I’m not on the job, there are plenty of hiking spots within an easy drive and Las Vegas just two hours away. What more could a reporter ask for?

— Abby Sewell

The contestants changed outfits three times. Former Teen Miss and Miss changed four. Sixteen-year-oldKassy Alexander’s favorite cardio activity is playing soccer, and she likes to spoil herself with a strawberry and cream frappuccino from Starbucks and a pedicure. She wore a sea-foam green dress. Leslie Ray, 21, likes to run on the treadmill and then go shopping with friends and eat ice cream. She wore a lime dress.

I know all this, and more, because I took notes. And I know the colors of the young women’s dresses because I asked my photographer, Aileen.

About mid-way through Saturday’s Miss Barstow Pageant, I could not believe I was furiously scribbling down the contestants’ favorite activities, their indulgences and counting wardrobe changes. I certainly did not get into this business to cover pageants. But by the end of the night, I certainly didn’t mind.

True, I did joke about covering Miss Barstow for most of the week leading up to the pageant. Pageant day is a long day for a reporter — it’s a longer day for the contestants and their mothers I am sure — and not one that will expose any government injustices, help the down-trodden or win a Pulitzer.

There are, however, many reasons why covering the Miss Barstow Pageant is great.

1) The gym is replete with stories.

Each contestant, each parent, each grandmother sitting in the gym chairs is a potential story, and they are not going anywhere for hours. I chose to focus on sisters this year but could have done stories on moms and grandmas who sew dresses, make-up experts that cannot drive yet or the little 7-year-old who wouldn’t smile with her mouth open and was pretty sure she wouldn’t win just because she lost her two front teeth a few months ago.

2) People are genuinely excited.

For most of those involved, this is a big deal. Like interviewing the quarterback after a big win, the contestants are normally up-beat and willing to talk about what it took to get where they are, how they are feeling and what they expect. Parents too are sometimes a little too anxious to grab the reporter’s arm and tell you how great their daughter is. This is a nice change from the all too routine practice of pulling teeth to get comments on a normal news day.

3) Great interviews.

All reporters know the horrors of interviewing a 10-year-old:

Q: Did you have fun today? A: Yes.

Q: What was your favorite part? A: Everything.

Q: What do you like about pageants? A: I like being in pageants.

Not so at the Miss Barstow Pageant. Even the two-year-old I talked to was comfortable enough to give me a good facial expression and say she was having lots of fun. The pacifier in her mouth made her a little hard to understand. The younger kids gave great insight into competing and the importance of sisters, and the older women did not seem to flinch when I started asking questions. Anne-Shirley Harpole, who won Teen Miss, was obviously comfortable answering questions and proved to be a great interview. And Miss Barstow AlyxBurnett was so unreserved with her emotions that I believed her when she said she was overwhelmed and left it at that.

4) And it’s just fun.

Everyone is dressed up. Everyone is excited. The audience is cheering. The girls are crying — some in joy, some in disappointment. Flash bulbs are exploding everywhere. The gym is a mob scene at the end. I told my photographer, it’s like being a real reporter, covering a real big event. And who doesn’t like that feeling.

5) Beauty queens can even make me look good.

Me interviewing Miss Barstow Alyx Burnett.

and me interviewing Teen Miss Barstow Anne-Shirley Harpole.

Even though I felt a little silly writing down that fifteen-year-old Victoria Herrera’s secret spoil is carneasada French fries from Amigos (I like Robertizo’s better) or that Danya Hawes wore a chocolate colored dress, better sounding that a brown dress, the pageant is still important and something I don’t mind taking notes at.

This post also is blogged on my Pluck blog “Leftovers” at  www.desertdispatch.com

Aaron Aupperlee | city editor

Authorities arrested a real Yuri Orlav this week in Thailand. Viktor Bout, 41, a reputed Russian arms dealer dubbed the “Merchant of Death” for his aid in fueling African civil wars, bears a striking resemblance to the Nichols Cage character in the 2005 film “Lord of War.”In the film, Cage plays a Russian arms dealer who profits nicely from the surplus of guns after the disenegration of the Soviet Union and the unrest besetting Africa. In reality, Bout did the same thing.According to the Associated Press, Bout could face war crimes charges for running guns on behalf of former Liberian leader Charles Taylor and the Sierra Leone rebel group, The Revolutionary United Front, responsible in part for the artocities committed in connection to “blood diamonds.” His guns have also been connected to a long list of countries and terrorists organizations in Asia, Africa and South America.  Stephen Rapp, chief prosecutor of a U.N.-backed war crimes tribunal, said weapons were delivered into the war zone “at the time they were conducting operations with names like ’No living thing,’ and being paid for those shipments with diamonds dug by slave labor.”At the end of “Lord of War,” Cage’s character goes free after agents track him down and discover his cache of weapons and documents in New York City. The rationale, according to Orlav:”Some of these men are the enemies of ‘your’ enemies. And while the biggest arms dealer in the world is your boss - the President of the United States, who ships more merchandise in a day than I do in a year - sometimes it’s embarrassing to have his fingerprints on the guns. Sometimes he needs a freelancer like me to supply forces he can’t be seen supplying. So. You call me evil, but unfortunately for you, I’m a necessary evil.”Bout’s fate appears to be less Hollywood. Thailand wants to prosecute him for involvement with terrorist attacks. The United States wants him on similar charges and the United Nations is considering war crimes.Aaron Aupperlee | City Editor