SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico’s top election official has again rejected an attempt to challenge a new gun control law by getting it on the ballot for voters to decide. Democratic Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver said the law to expand background checks to nearly all private gun sales was designed to improve public safety and therefore …

Lea County Sheriff’s deputies completed an annual sex offender compliance operation this weekend that resulted in arrest/hold orders for five of the some 100 registered offenders in the county. A list of offenders and their registered locations can be found at www.offender-watch.com. A number of the offenders listed are incarcerated at the Lea County Detention Center. Sheriff Byron Wester said the …