Texas: Judge raises bond for hit-and-run suspect

A judge raised bond to $250,000 Friday for a nurse’s aide accused of killing a homeless man by hitting him with her car and leaving him to die in her garage.

Chante J. Mallard, 25, had been released on $10,000 bail after she was arrested Wednesday. Prosecutors said that amount was too low.

Mallard, who wept in the courtroom, was taken into custody after the hearing.

She is accused of slamming into Gregory Biggs last fall on a highway near her home in Fort Worth, then driving home with his head lodged in the windshield. Police said Mallard ignored Biggs’ cries for help as he bled to death over the next two days in her garage. His body was dumped in a park, where it was found Oct. 27.

Mallard faces five years to life in prison if convicted. Police say they expect more arrests in the case.

New Mexico: Three dead in pileup

Wind-fanned smoke and flame from a construction fire swept across Interstate 40 on Friday, triggering a fiery 14-vehicle pileup that killed three people and injured several others near Santa Rosa.

Several vehicles were still burning three hours after the crash, state police Maj. Faron Segotta said.

The initial fire started at a railroad construction site near Cuervo, east of Santa Rosa.

“The fire jumped the interstate and created smoke,” Segotta said. “Traffic slowed, and a chain-reaction accident ensued.”

A school bus was in the crash. Nobody on the bus was killed, but some had minor injuries, Segotta said.

New York: Fire destroys temple

A fire that broke out early Friday morning gutted two buildings housing the oldest Sikh temple in North America and center of the 150,000-member Sikh community in the New York region.

Flames engulfed the two-story wood frame structure, part of the Sikh Cultural Society where officials believe the fire started.

About a dozen people who were inside the buildings were able to flee.

A priest from New Delhi suffered a heart attack and was admitted to Jamaica Hospital in critical condition. Six other people, including two firefighters, suffered minor injuries.

Fire Chief Joseph Callen said there was no indication if the fire was intentional or if it was caused by a gas leak.

More than 2,500 worshipped there on weekends and 10,000 on holidays.