PUEBLO, Colo. (AP) — A wildfire burning southwest of Denver has forced the evacuation of thousands of residents and destroyed more than 160 structures by Friday as erratic winds pushed the blaze across two Colorado counties.
The Aspen Acres fire is one of about 40 uncontained large blazes burning mostly in the West, fueled by months of dry weather and a record lack of snow this past winter in some places.
Fire personnel were scooping water from the Pueblo Reservoir to fight Aspen Acres fire, which expanded overnight by 17 square miles (44 square kilometers) which brought it up to nearly 105 square miles (272 square kilometers) by Friday with zero containment.
All of Colorado City, an unincorporated community of about 2,200, was ordered evacuated as well as the towns of Beulah, Rye and San Isabel, according to the Pueblo County Sheriff's Office.
About 50 National Guard soldiers were being sent in Friday to help with staffing checkpoints on roads in Custer and Pueblo counties.
Guard members would also help State Park Rangers as they bring on additional boats to keep boaters clear of water-scooping operations.
Fire crews on the western side of the Rocky Mountains had contained about 65% of the Snyder Fire on the Colorado/Utah border, where three members of a Helitack team were killed and two others injured last weekend when they were overcome by flames.
The Cottonwood fire in southwestern Utah had grown to more than 147 square miles (380 square kilometers) by Friday while the Babylon fire in the southeast corner of the state was up to 133 square miles (344 square kilometers).
A burned section of the Snyder Fire seen from across the Colorado River in Mack, Colorado, on Sunday, June 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Ty O'Neil)
A plane drops a load of water on the Aspen Acres Fire near Colorado City, Colo., on Thursday, July 2, 2026. (Michael Seamans/The Gazette via AP)
The Louisiana Supreme Court on Friday halted the criminal case against state Attorney General Liz Murrill a day after she was indicted on accusations that she threatened the jobs of officials in New Orleans.
The state's top court said the local court and special prosecutor in the case did not follow proper procedures in the process surrounding the indictment — including multiple local media reports that the court handcuffed and locked out a journalist attempting to report on the grand jury action.
Friday's stay puts the case on hold, at least for now. Murrill, a Republican, said she intends to ask a court to dismiss the case, which shows a deep rift between Republican state officials and the Democrats who control the state's most populous city.
“I hope this political witch hunt is not a harbinger of things to come,” she said in a statement Friday, “but I fear that it is.”
The 16-count indictment handed up Thursday by a New Orleans grand jury accused Murrill, the state's first female attorney general, with intimidation and malfeasance.
The Supreme Court says there were deep flaws with the charges.
“This indictment appears to turn the law on its head and flows from what appear to be extraordinary procedural defects and improprieties,” the court said in a filing signed by Justice Jay McCallum, a Republican.
The court says there are likely conflicts of interest involving Laurie White, the special prosecutor and former state judge who brought the charges, including that she's being defended by the attorney general's office against a sexual harassment lawsuit.
McCallum's explanation also notes that the law used in the intimidation charge against Murrill requires that threats be “unlawful or include a threat of bodily harm or death.”
The court also found the attorney general is likely to succeed in having the case dismissed and that she would suffer irreparable harm if it can move forward.
The order was issued by all four of the Republican justices and one Democrat. The court's other Democrat and an independent dissented. Justice John Guidry, a Democrat, was critical of the quick decision by his colleagues. "Due process and equal protection under the law does not allow anyone to cut the line and have their matters considered more preferentially than others,” he wrote.
The case is fallout from a major political battle in Louisiana.
The state this year abolished the job of the New Orleans criminal court clerk — merging it with another court clerk position. That action came months after Calvin Duncan, who spent decades in prison before his murder conviction was vacated, was elected to the criminal clerk office.
Murrill and other GOP officials have refused to acknowledge Duncan's innocence, though he's listed on the National Registry of Exonerations.
The court noted that Duncan was previously represented by White — which it called "a likely conflict of interest."
A letter from Murrill to New Orleans' city council members and Mayor Helena Moreno came after the city council set a special election that would have given Duncan a shot at the combined clerk role. Murrill told officials they could lose their offices for violating state laws that forbid support for an unauthorized officeholder.
Murrill has said she was doing her job.
After the indictment was issued Thursday, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican, said he would pardon Murrill. The governor also said on social media that he was ordering state police to investigate “the alleged improprieties of this grand jury and those who ran it.”
On Friday, the governor thanked the Supreme Court and called the indictment “a political witch hunt” against Murrill.
FILE - Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill speaks with attendees during an election night watch party for U.S. Senate candidate Rep. Julia Letlow, R-La., May 16, 2026, in Baton Rouge, La. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton, File)
