May 05, 2016

Dear Sir or Madam,

Yaateeh, our names are Owen Willeto, Clint Willeto and we are 08 and 06 years old. We both attend Wingate Elementary School in Fort Wingate, NM and are in third and first grades.  We live in the community of White Cliffs, east of Gallup and our parents are Patrick Willeto and Cheryl Benally.  We are of the Water Flows Together clan born for the Red Bottom clan.

Today, we are informing you of a project that we both feel very dear to and request for your assistance. In light of the recent tragic events that have taken place on the Navajo Nation, we feel that it is our duty to help the young students who attend Ojo Amarillo Elementary School in Fruitland, NM. We understand that it is probably very difficult to deal with the loss of their beloved classmate, the late Ashlynne Mike. As students ourselves, we have spoken with our parents about our feelings of the loss and also the feelings her brother, Ian who survived the ordeal.

During times of difficulty we’ve always found comfort in our big teddy bear that our cousin Faith Holyan gave us and we know a teddy bear or stuffed animal will help the students and classmates left behind. We are asking for donations of new or used stuffed animals or teddy bears. We are able to provide a decorated box that we can set up for your area.  We would like the teddy bear/stuffed animal drive to begin right away and run until Monday May 16, 2016.  Our family will be delivering the collected teddy bears/stuffed animals to Ojo Amarillo Elementary School the next day.

We are hoping to collect enough teddy bears/stuffed animals for the entire school which has a student body of 474.  The idea came to us while watching the news and noticing that the Albuquerque Police Department give out these items to young children who are afraid.  Our mother can be reached at (505) 728-1463 if you need more information. We thank you for your time and consideration of our request.

Sincerely,

Owen Willeto

Clint Willeto

UPDATE: Teddy bear drop off locations are : AJ Tires, Nu Kreation Hair Salon, Rio West Mall office, Shima Grill & Transport, and the UPS Store.

Chee Dodge Elementary went under lockdown after a man allegedly showed up to the school with multiple guns and threatened to shoot his ex-wife, who is an employee there.

Around 2:15 pm on June 11, McKinley County Deputy Jarad Albert was dispatched to the elementary school at 64 U.S. Hwy. 491 when a woman called Metro Dispatch and said that a man, who was identified as Donovoan Nuckols, was on school property with a gun.

When Albert arrived at the school he met with two women who were standing in the parking lot. One of the women said that Nuckols, 40, was her ex-husband. She explained that he’d come to the school wanting to talk to her.

The former couple had been married for about 20 years. The woman said there was no former incidences of domestic abuse, but she admitted that Nuckols had been acting strangely the last couple of weeks.

They reportedly met in the school’s front office and began arguing. The woman said that Nuckols believed she had cheated on him. The victim said Nuckols had accused her of cheating on him multiple times in the past couple of weeks. The former couple had been living in separate residences for a few days.

The woman said that earlier that morning Nuckols had texted her multiple times, starting at 5 am and ending at 11 am. One of the last texts he allegedly sent to her said “Later goodbye b****, I hate you.”

During their argument in the front office Nuckhols allegedly told his ex-wife “I just wanted to come see your face, tell you that you make me sick.” He continued by saying “I f*****g hate you, go look at your car.”

Nuckols then allegedly walked out of the school building and headed toward his own vehicle which was parked in the school’s bus lane.

The woman said she followed Nickols outside. When she got outside Nuckols was standing next to his SUV with the front passenger side door wide open. He then reportedly took what the victim believed to be a black gun out of the SUV.

When she saw the gun the victim reportedly asked Nuckols “What are you doing? You’re at school!”

Another woman had come outside with the victim, and she told Albert that the gun Nuckols had looked like an AK-47. Nuckols’ ex-wife said the gun was an AR-15 style gun.

Both women said they weren’t in fear for their lives, and that they didn’t think Nuckols would shoot them.

After Nuckols pulled out the gun his ex-wife walked to her own vehicle, which was parked on the other side of the parking lot. At that point Nuckols got back into his SUV and drove through the parking lot, heading toward her and her vehicle. The woman said Nuckols almost hit her with his SUV.

While the victim was walking to her car the other Chee Dodge Elementary employee who’d come outside with her ran into the building and told other employees of the school what was going on. The school went on lockdown.

In his report, Albert said that the lockdown led to problems for parents who were trying to pick their children up from school.

Back outside, the woman was allegedly standing near her vehicle when Nuckols began yelling at her from the driver’s seat of his SUV. He told her, “Call the f*****g cops, I don’t care. I’m going to f*****g kill myself.”

While Nuckols was allegedly yelling at the woman he pulled out a silver revolver and placed it against the side of his own head.

The victim told Nuckols she was going to call the police and then Nuckhols put his SUV in gear and quickly left the school parking lot.  He then sped off, heading southbound on U.S. Highway 491.

In his report Albert stated that Nuckols hit the victim’s car with his SUV at some point before he met her in the school’s office. There was visible damage to the driver’s side rear corner panel. The victim estimated that it would cost about $7,000 to fix the damage.

Nuckols was reportedly driving a silver Lincoln Navigator with no license plates. Albert gave Metro Dispatch a description of the SUV, and other deputies began looking for the vehicle.

Less than 10 minutes later, Deputy Terrence Willie found the vehicle near South State Highway 602 and West Aztec Avenue.  Nuckols would reportedly not slow down for the deputy, and Willie had to turn on his emergency lights and sirens and began to chase Nuckhol’s vehicle. The car chase lasted about seven minutes and ended at the intersection of First Street and Wilson Avenue, which is on the opposite side of Gallup from Chee Dodge Elementary.

During the car chase Nuckols reportedly drove on the wrong side of the road and almost crashed into another vehicle. Nuckols allegedly reached about 60 miles per hour in the downtown Gallup area, where people were walking around.

During an interview the victim told Albert that she believed Nuckols could be using drugs, such as marijuana and/or meth.

In an interview with the Sun, McKinley County Sheriff James Maiorano III said that after deputies reviewed the school’s surveillance footage and they searched Nuckols’ SUV, it was determined that the gun he pointed at the victim and the other school employee was a paintball gun. But he did have two real guns in his SUV, and he used one of them when he told the victim he was going to kill himself.

Maiorano praised his deputies for their quick response to the situation.

“I thought our deputies did an outstanding job of coordinating and communicating with each other to get that [car] pursuit ended as quickly and as safely as possible,” he said. “The suspect was taken into custody without the use of force or any other type of tactic, so we consider that without incident.”

He also praised Chee Dodge Elementary staff for how they handled the incident.

“I thought the school staff did an amazing job of recognizing the threat and using their iloveyouguys Foundation protocol to call for a lockdown and make sure that the rest of the staff and students were safe and secure inside the school while they waited for law enforcement to arrive and deal with the threat that was outside the school,” Maiorano said.

The school’s lockdown only lasted for about 10 minutes. It was lifted once law enforcement arrived at the scene. Maiorano said school pick-up wasn’t really affected, since the lockdown occurred before students were scheduled to be let out.

Nuckols was charged with unlawful carrying of a deadly weapon on school premises, aggravated assault against a household member, aggravated fleeing a law enforcement officer, criminal damage to property of a household member, and interference with members of staff or the general public (refusal to leave). His preliminary hearing is scheduled for June 26.

New Mexico law states that bringing a firearm onto school property is only a misdemeanor, not a felony. Mariano voiced his frustration with the law.

“I think New Mexico legislature is lacking when it comes to this particular law. Making a bomb threat on that type of establishment is a felony,  but making a threat to shoot at a school or other public building is only a misdemeanor,” he said.

Staff Reports

Bonaguidi, Schaff reflect on growing up in Gallup

Neighborhood kids gathering together for a game of backyard baseball. Or shooting hoops at a friend’s house. These are some of Mayor Louie Bonaguidi’s favorite memories of growing up in Gallup during the ‘60s and ‘70s.

THE BONAGUIDIS MOVE TO GALLUP

The Bonaguidi family chose Gallup as their home in 1924 after Louie’s father Sesto and his brother Mario decided to expand their shoe repair business. They already had a store in Albuquerque, but they’d both heard great things about the mining town of Gallup and decided to give it a try.

The two men traveled back and forth between Gallup and Albuquerque for a while before Mario fell in love with an Albuquerque schoolteacher and decided to stay in the big city full time. Sesto chose to make Gallup his family’s home.

That was in 1924, and City Electric Shoe Shop officially celebrated its 100th anniversary this year. Although Louie said they aren’t planning the big celebration until next year.

While his father was running the shoe repair store, Louie was busy growing up. He attended Cathedral School for most of his education, but then transferred to Gallup High School his sophomore year before graduating in 1963.

He remembers his childhood growing up in Gallup fondly.

“Growing up, the neighborhoods were great,” he said. “There was like 30-40 kids in [the neighborhood I grew up in]. Playing hide-and-seek with about 15 to 20 people is quite fun.”

As a teenager, the Zuni Drive-In was a popular place to meet up with friends and hang out. Or a group of them would go visit the local pool.

“Summers were always great,” Louie said. “Winters were kind of hard because the snow always seemed terrible. We’d get snow all the way from Thanksgiving until May.”

Louie said the closeness of the small town had its pros and cons during his childhood. He knew almost everyone in town, but that also meant everyone knew him.

“It was hard to stay out of trouble because everybody knew each other,” Louie said. “If you got in trouble you’d be in trouble with the whole community.”

For example, when Louie and his friends first got their drivers’ licenses, they once stayed out until 3 am driving around town.

While Louie was in grade school, his father hired the first Diné-speaking employee at City Electric Shoe Shop. Back then, many Navajo people didn’t speak English, so it was difficult to find someone who spoke both languages fluently. Sesto spoke a little bit of the language, and when he was younger Louie knew enough so that he could tell people how much something cost. But he said he’s lost most of the language now.

MOVING TO

GALLUP AT EIGHT

Michael Schaaf wasn’t born in Gallup. His family moved to town when he was eight years old after his father got a job working at what is now the Gallup Indian Medical Center.

His family’s house sat on the corner of Puerto Drive and Coal Avenue, which made it the perfect spot for Michael and his three siblings to watch the Gallup Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonial parade by hanging out the house’s windows as it rolled on by.

Schaaf’s mother could walk to the grocery store because a lot of stores were located downtown.

“Downtown was kind of my playground,” Schaaf said. “We just ran around downtown.”

He said the sense of community was something he really loved about growing up in Gallup.

“The nice thing about it was that at the time you might not know a person by name, but you knew where they worked,” Schaaf said. “Now, the town’s gotten so big [that] you walk into these stores, and I don’t know half the people in the stores anymore.”

WHAT’S CHANGED

IN THE PAST 60 YEARS

Louie and Schaaf both agree that Gallup has changed quite a lot since their childhoods.

Businesses have come and gone in Gallup. JCPenney used to be where Sammy C’s Rock N’ Sports Pub & Grille stands now. The town didn’t even have a McDonald’s in 1970.

According to the U.S. Census, just over 14,000 people lived in Gallup in 1960. The 2020 census recorded that almost 22,000 people lived in Gallup at that time. That’s a 63% population increase.

Louie said that the population increase has led to a lot of different changes, including an increase in traffic and unfortunately, an increase in crime.

“Traffic is a lot worse than it was back then,” Louie said. “There was very little traffic back then. Even though Highway 66 went right through town, it wasn’t until the ‘80s that traffic all of a sudden was unbelievable.”

These days drugs like fentanyl and meth are easily found in the streets of Gallup, but Louie said drugs weren’t as big of a problem back then.

“Back then, drugs were virtually unknown,” he said. “If anything, it was alcohol that was the biggest detriment to our community. Now, even raising my own kids and watching my grandkids grow up, we have to be so much closer to them, attached to them.”

When he was in school, Louie would often walk to school. Now, he said he doesn’t even dream of that for his grandkids.

For most of Louie’s childhood, the only major roadway in Gallup was Highway 66. Gallup’s part of Interstate 40 wasn’t completed until 1980.

Schaaf said he’s noticed that people are less involved in community activities now than during his childhood.

“The town was more involved in everything,” he said. “When the Ceremonial was going on, all the businesses would post advertisements in their windows months in advance. And during the Ceremonial everyone would get involved.”

Nowadays, Schaaf believes some people don’t even know when the Ceremonial is happening.

KEEPING

MEMORIES ALIVE

After his parents passed away, his mom in 1993 and his dad in 2007, Schaaf realized the importance of holding on to memories.

A large part of his teenage years and young adult life was spent listening to the older generations’ stories. He would sit at the local diner and listen to the people who built Gallup, who were born in the 1920s and ‘30s.

“I used to love to sit and listen to them tell stories from back in the ‘20s and ‘30s and what went on. But now a lot of them have passed away and a lot of those stories are gone now,” he said.

He never got the chance to do this with his parents, but now he tells people all the time to sit their parents down and have them tell stories of the past.

“Sit your parents down before they pass away and interview them,” Schaaf said. “Record it and have it on tape. I failed to do that.”

Today, Schaaf finds himself attending more and more funerals for the people he grew up listening to. At one recent funeral he remembers telling a friend “All the old timers are dying.” The friend responded by saying, “You know what that means, right? Now we’re the old timers.”

Schaaf said he’s still working on taking his own advice and writing down his own memories for future generations.

“Everybody tells me I need to sit down and start writing down my memories of Gallup,” he said. “And I just don’t do it. But the memories are starting to slip away, and I know I need to sit down and do it.”

By Molly Ann Howell
Managing Editor

Toriano Adaryll "Tito" Jackson, one of the brothers who made up the famous group the Jackson 5, died while he was traveling through New Mexico on his way home to Tulsa, OK. He suffered an alleged heart attack and later died at a local hospital.

On Sept. 15, around 6:15 pm, a Gallup Police Officer was flagged down near the American Heritage Plaza located at 702 U.S. Hwy. 791. The officer was informed that a man needed immediate medical attention. The man was identified as Jackson, 70.

Jackson was transported via ambulance to a local hospital, where he later died.

In a press release published on Sept. 16 the Gallup Police stated that investigation into Jackson’s death was still ongoing. Investigators are currently interviewing witnesses.

TITO'S LEGACY

The Jackson 5 rose to fame in the late ‘60s and ‘70s. The five brothers began their music careers by performing at school events and talent shows when Tito was only 12.

In 1969, the group signed with Motown Records, and they soon had multiple hit songs under their belts, such as “ABC,” “I Want You Back,” “The Love You Save” and “I’ll Be There.” Tito’s younger brother Michael was the lead singer of the group.

The brothers were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997.

Tito began his solo career in 2003, performing in a variety of clubs with his band. In 2016, he had his first commercially successful solo single on the Billboard charts with the single, "Get It Baby," featuring Big Daddy Kane from his album Tito Time, becoming the ninth and final Jackson family sibling to place a solo single on the charts.

His three sons, Taj T.J., and Taryll posted on Instagram on Sept. 15 mourning their father’s death. The three men have their own music group called 3T.

“We are shocked, saddened and heartbroken,” the three sons said in a joint statement. “Our father was an incredible man who cared about everyone and their well-being. Some of you may know him as Tito Jackson from the legendary Jackson 5, some may know him as ‘Coach Tito’ or some know him as ‘Poppa T.’ Nevertheless, he will be missed tremendously.”

Besides his three sons and grandchildren, Tito leaves behind his mother, Katherine Jackson,  and siblings Rebbie, Jermaine, Randy, Marlon, Jackie, La Toya and Janet Jackson. Katherine and the late Joe Jackson had 10 kids. Tito was their third child.

Prior to his death, Tito had been touring Europe with brothers Jackie and Marlon as the Jacksons and had shows in Scotland, California and England over the summer of 2024.

On Sept. 11 he posted on Facebook from Munich, Germany, where he visited a memorial for his late brother Michael.

“Before our show in Munich, my brothers Jackie, Marlon, and I, visited the beautiful memorial dedicated to our beloved brother, Michael Jackson,” Tito said. “We’re deeply grateful for this special place that honors not only his memory but also our shared legacy. Thank you for keeping his spirit alive.”

Tito’s death comes over 15 years after brother Michael passed away at 50 in 2009.

The “Thriller” singer died from acute propofol intoxication. The King of Pop’s physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in 2011 for giving him dangerous levels of the anesthetic propofol and other sedatives.