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Garance Burke

This frame grab taken from video provided by Roxana and Carlos Guzman shows a Limo on fire Saturday, May 4, 2013, on the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge in San Francisco. Five dead female bodies were found pressed up against the partition behind the driver, where they apparently tried to escape the smoke and fire that kept them from the rear exits of the extended passenger compartment. (AP Photo/Roxana and Carlos Guzman)

Accounts of fatal limo fire differ between survivor, driver

Garance Burke, Martha Mendoza The Associated Press

Last updated Tuesday, May 7, 2013 - 9:15am

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. — As smoke thickened and a fire grew in the back of a limousine, Nelia Arellano desperately tried to squeeze through a 3 foot by 1 1/2-foot partition.

Stuck for a moment, Arellano made her way into the front seat. Three of her friends quickly followed. Five others didn’t make it. Their bodies were later found pressed against the partition.

Bride, Fatal fire, National Read more Comments

Cause of fatal limo fire still a mystery

Garance Burke, Martha Mendoza The Associated Press

Last updated Monday, May 6, 2013 - 4:47pm

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. — Authorities searched for answers Monday in the fire that roared through a stretch limo packed with women on a girls’ night out, hoping to learn what sparked the blaze and why five of the victims could not escape the fast-spreading flames.

The women who were killed were found pressed up against the partition behind the driver, apparently because smoke and fire kept them from the rear exits of the extended passenger compartment.

Bride, Fatal fire, National Read more Comments

Thousands rally for immigration reform

Garance Burke, Luis Alonso Lugo The Associated Press

Last updated Wednesday, April 10, 2013 - 3:10pm

WASHINGTON -- Thousands of immigrants and activists rallied nationwide Wednesday in a coordinated set of protests aimed at pressing Congress to approve immigration measures that would grant 11 million immigrants living here illegally a path toward citizenship.

Immigration law, Protests, Immigration, National Read more Comments

FILE- A Feb. 9, 2007 file photo provided by the Department of Homeland Security shows family detainees walking down the hall at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor, Texas. The U.S. is locking up more illegal immigrants than ever before, generating a lucrative business for the nation's largest prison companies. (AP Photo/Department of Homeland Security, Charles Reed, HO, File)

Illegal immigrants prove big business for prison companies

Garance Burke, Laura Wides-Munoz The Associated Press

Last updated Thursday, August 2, 2012 - 9:59am

MIAMI — The U.S. is locking up more illegal immigrants than ever, generating lucrative profits for the nation’s largest prison companies, and an Associated Press review shows the businesses have spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying lawmakers and contributing to campaigns.

Business, Immigration Read more Comments

$In this July 27 file photo, the sun shines over a Range Resources well site in Washington, Pa. The company is one of many drilling into the Marcellus Shale layer deep underground and "fracking" the area to release natural gas. The federal government needs to track safety hazards tied to thousands of unregulated pipelines gathering new oil and gas supplies released through the fracking process, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office. (AP Photo/Keith Srakocic)$

Audit: Gas lines tied to fracking lack oversight

Garance Burke The Associated Press

Last updated Saturday, March 24, 2012 - 10:43pm

SAN FRANCISCO — Government auditors say federal officials know nothing about thousands of miles of pipelines that carry natural gas released through the drilling method known as fracking and need to step up oversight to make sure they are running safely.

Amid the gas-drilling boom, private companies have put in hundreds of small gathering pipelines in recent years to collect new fuel supplies released through the high-pressure drilling technique.

Business, Drilling, Earthquake, earthquakes, Fracking, Gas drilling, groundwater, Natural gas, Oil drilling, Public Safety, Utah, Water Read more Comments

(CHRIS CARLSON/The Associated Press) In this Oct. 19, 2011 photo, Seth Shteir, a California Desert Field Representative for the National Parks Conservation Association, hikes to a natural spring at the Mojave National Preserve near Kelso, Calif. By tapping into an aquifer the size of Rhode Island under a 35,000-acre Cadiz ranch, proponents say they can supply 400,000 people with drinking water in only a few years. “There’s a lot of unknowns here but we think this project has the potential to adversely affect air quality, draw down water resources and alter the flow of groundwater beneath the Mojave Preserve,” says Shteir, whose association plans to scrutinize an environmental review of the project, expected to be released this month.

Oasis or mirage? Company wants to tap Mojave water

Garance Burke, Noaki Schwartz The Associated Press

Last updated Sunday, November 6, 2011 - 5:26pm

CADIZ, Calif. — Off historic Route 66 in the heart of the California desert the barren landscape of dry scrub and rock abruptly gives way to an oasis of tall green trees heavy with lemons and grape vines awaiting next month’s harvest.

Mojave Desert, Water, National Read more Comments

(ANDA CHU/The Associated Press) Hayward Police officers are seen along a dirt road near Pleasanton Sunol Road at Verona Road where a body was found in Pleasanton, Calif., on Saturday, Sept. 17, 2011. Authorities are trying to determine if it may be the body of missing nursing student Michelle Le, who disappeared on May 27. A former friend, Giselle Esteban, 27, was arrested Sept. 7 on suspicion of murder.

Body found in search for missing nursing student

Garance Burke The Associated Press

Last updated Sunday, September 18, 2011 - 5:38pm

SUNOL, Calif. — Relatives of a missing California nursing student said Sunday the family was grateful that police and volunteer searchers had located a body but could not comment on whether the remains were that of the 26-year-old woman who disappeared in May.

Body Found, Missing Person, Fatality, National Read more Comments

Nation’s food anti-terror plans costly, unwieldy

Garance Burke The Associated Press

Last updated Tuesday, September 13, 2011 - 7:11am

SAN FRANCISCO — One of the deepest fears sweeping a shattered nation following the Sept. 11 attacks was that terrorists might poison the country’s food.

Homeland Security, Terrorism, Terrorist attacks, Food, National Read more Comments

Driver in Amtrak crash had multiple violations

Garance Burke, Martin Griffith The Associated Press The Associated Press

Last updated Monday, June 27, 2011 - 9:59pm

RENO, Nev. — Workers wearing hazmat suits dug through burnt-out rail cars and twisted metal Monday at the scene of a horrific collision between a tractor-trailer and an Amtrak train as new details surfaced about the spotty driving record of the man at the wheel of the truck.

Amtrak, Crash, Fatal Read more Comments

$1.7B worth of pot seized in Central Calif. sweep

Garance Burke, The Associated Press

Last updated Thursday, July 29, 2010 - 10:28pm

FRESNO, Calif. -- Nearly 100 people have been arrested in an ongoing sweep of marijuana-growing operations that has netted more than $1.7 billion worth of pot in California's Sierra Nevada range, federal and state agents said Thursday.

Outdoors, Crime, Drugs, Immigration, Law Enforcement Read more Comments