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