My writing background is rather unique in that I would likely not be working for a gun magazine had it not been for my dad, Skeeter. I grew up shooting - the old man had me plinking with a .22 rifle at age four or five. He had me in a Winchester pump .22 at about six, and a Colt .22 SA at about ten. I knocked around in the New Mexico desert with those guns for years. Of course, I also had the chance to shoot quite a few of my dad's test guns, too. I was also blessed with the opportunity to grow up knowing some fine men who are frequently mentioned in this forum.
Went off to various colleges, rodeoed and cowboyed in the summer. Worked several big outfits, including the famed Vermejo Park. I was accepted to the New Mexico State Police academy in 1984 and was an officer with that fine department for about five years. When my dad passed on in 1988, Shooting Times asked me if I would be interested in submitting a few stories, which I clearly accepted. I later went to work as a special agent with the U.S. Customs Service, working on the New Mexico/Chihuahua border. I had a monthly column with ST for a few years, too.
G&A hired me back in 1998 to write my "Down on the Border" byline, which, fortunately, I still have. I'm currently the Resident Agent in Charge with ICE (formerly the Customs Service), and am still on the border. G&A and Jerry Lee at Handguns occasionally permit me to submit feature articles, so I tend to stay on the busy side.
I've written a novel, "Juarez Romance", a story about things I'm familiar with - drug smuggling, murder and corruption on both sides of the border. I hope to have it published in the near future.
The opportunity to write for ST and G&A has been quite an honor for me, especially in following my dad's footsteps, though I know I'll never fill those boots.
