2 Army Rangers are killed in Iraq

Two Army Rangers assigned to this post south of Tacoma have been killed in Iraq, the Department of Defense said Tuesday.

Staff Sgt. Ricardo Barraza, 24, of Shafter, Calif., and Sgt. Dale G. Brehm, 23, of Turlock, Calif., died March 18 in Ramadi, Iraq, when they came under enemy fire, the department said in a news release.

Both were assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, a special-forces unit.

Barraza enlisted in the military after graduating from high school in 1999, his family told The Bakersfield Californian on Monday. Relatives said he was shot in the chest while helping evacuate a building in Iraq. He had been in Iraq since 2002.

Brehm joined the military in 2001 after graduating from Turlock Adult School. He had been married for two years, and Tuesday would have been his 24th birthday, according to the Modesto Bee.

Kent man charged after fatal accident

A Kent man has been charged with vehicular homicide in connection with a March 14 car accident on Highway 164 in Auburn that killed two young men.

Adrian Everybodytalksabout, 18, is accused of speeding without a valid driver's license. There were five passengers in the car when it crossed into oncoming traffic, then veered off the side of the road before flipping upside down and bursting into flames.

Two of the passengers, Michael E. Paul and Richard T. Wilson, died at the scene.

Everybodytalksabout is scheduled to be arraigned April 3.

A 24-year-old Arlington man injured in a rollover accident Sunday died Tuesday afternoon, according to Marysville police.

The identity of the man, a passenger in the car, has not been released. He was thrown from the car when it rolled over near 172nd Street Northeast and 19th Avenue Northeast in Marysville at 4:30 a.m., police said.

After being treated for minor injuries, the 21-year-old driver from Marysville was booked into the Snohomish County Jail on suspicion of vehicular assault, police said.

Police said they are awaiting toxicology reports.

Information sought in puppy's death

Investigators with King County Animal Services are asking the public's help in finding the person responsible for burning a puppy with acid, forcing it to be euthanized.

Mooie, a 4-month-old female pit bull, was found critically injured in the fenced yard of a Federal Way woman March 10. Staff members at an Auburn veterinary clinic determined the puppy probably had been dipped in a caustic substance that ate through more than 90 percent of her skin.

Animal-control staffers and Federal Way police have gone door to door in the area where the dog was found. Pasado's Safe Haven, a Sultan-based animal-welfare organization, is offering a $15,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction.

Anyone with information is asked to call King County Animal Services at 206-296-PETS or Pasado's Safe Haven at 425-269-3621.

Times' series wins health-care award

The Seattle Times has won a first-place prize in the 2005 Awards for Excellence in Health Care Journalism for a five-part series showing how the pharmaceutical industry influences the defining of diseases.

The series, "Suddenly sick: The hidden big business behind your doctor's diagnosis," was written by investigative reporters Susan Kelleher and Duff Wilson and published June 26-30 last year. Wilson is now with The New York Times. The series can be read online at www.seattletimes.com/suddenlysick.

The series, which was awarded first place for newspapers with circulations above 250,000, found that the drug industry has commandeered the process by which diseases are defined, and has worked to change the definition of health even when there is no strong medical evidence for doing so.

The awards were sponsored by the Association of Health Care Journalists, a not-for-profit professional group that works to advance public understanding of health issues and to improve the quality, accuracy and visibility of health-care reporting.

Seattle

Legal team honored in aid to immigrants

A team of attorneys from Microsoft and Seattle law firms has been awarded the Corporate Pro Bono Partner Award for its public-service project Volunteer Advocates for Immigrant Justice (VAIJ).

VAIJ is a legal-representation program in the Seattle area that offers free legal assistance to detained immigrants seeking asylum or other forms of relief before the immigration courts.

Collaborating law firms include Davis Wright Tremaine LLP; Dorsey & Whitney LLP; Heller Ehrman LLP; Holland & Knight LLP; Perkins Coie LLP; Preston Gates & Ellis LLP; and Riddell Williams P.S.

Times staff and news services