Las Vegas news briefs

Monday, Dec. 14, 1998 | 11:34 a.m.

It was originally thought that the leak had started in the furnace at 1402 E. St. Louis Ave., but investigators have learned that the furnace had recently been serviced for winter use, fire department officials said.

The damage to the house, which is estimated at $64,000, was so great that it is impossible for investigators to determine if the leak began outside the house and the gas seeped in, or if it started in the house, fire officials said.

Two small children who were playing in their yard next door to the home that exploded were treated and released from University Medical Center for scrapes and bruises from flying debris.

Arthur Taylor, 77, who was the only one in the duplex when it exploded, was treated and released from UMC with minor burns. Taylor told investigators that he heard the furnace turn on and then heard a rumbling in the walls a few seconds before the house exploded.

METH LAB -- Metro Police are looking for a suspect in connection with a meth lab bust in Laughlin on Thursday.

Cynthia Franklin, 39, rented a Laughlin hotel room where police found a small amount of methamphetamine, the components to a large meth lab, a shotgun and a handgun, police said.

Franklin, who was staying in the room with another female suspect, who was arrested Thursday, is 5-foot-2, 118 pounds, has blonde hair and blue eyes, with a last known address of Hesperia, Calif.

Anyone with information on Franklin is asked to call police at 298-2223 or Secret Witness at 385-5555.

ACCIDENT -- The actions of a 17-year-old may have saved the life of another teenager after he used a jack to lift a wrecked car off his friend on the road that leads to Mount Charleston on Saturday.

A car carrying four teenagers was westbound on State Route 157 when it left the road at about 3:30 a.m. causing the driver to overcorrect and roll the car twice, Nevada Highway Patrol Trooper Scott Flabi said.

The driver, Lucas McWaters, 18, and passengers Chad Scott, 18, and another 18-year-old, who died at the scene, were not wearing their seatbelts, Flabi said.

Derek Robinder, 17, was wearing his seatbelt and was not injured in the accident. McWaters was pinned under the car, and Robinder used a jack to raise the car and pull McWaters to safety, Las Vegas Fire Department spokesman Tim Szymanski said.

McWaters remains in fair condition at University Medical Center, while Scott is in critical but stable condition.

SHOOTING -- A man who was shot to death Saturday in the 3000 block of Torrey Pines Drive, near Cheyenne Avenue has been identified by Metro Police as Stephen Jacaruso.

The 36-year-old Las Vegan was found by police in a sports utility vehicle at about 9:15 p.m. after residents had called police saying that they had seen someone with a gun in the neighborhood.

Police believed the suspect to be in the residence that the vehicle was parked at and the SWAT team was called in. After an almost three-hour standoff, James Perdue, 53, surrendered to police and was booked at the Clark County Detention Center on a murder count.