A bumper sticker proclaiming “vaccinated” sparked a confrontation between two drivers that nearly ended with a different kind of shot Sunday.
Christina Blair of Rio Rancho is accused of accosting another driver over the sticker before pulling a gun on him in Northeast Albuquerque.
The 33-year-old is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in the Feb. 27 incident. Blair has been booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center.
Blair’s family and her attorney could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Prosecutors have filed a motion to keep Blair — who reportedly works for a car dealership — behind bars until trial, calling her “a dangerous person.”
Blair’s criminal history, according to online court records, includes four juvenile offenses that were “all violent in nature.” In 2007, she was sentenced to three years of probation after pleading guilty to aggravated assault and tampering with evidence. The details of that case were unclear.
Blair’s most recent brush with the law began with a bumper sticker.
Police responded around 5 p.m. to a Walgreens at Montgomery and Wyoming NE after a man reported being threatened by a woman with a gun, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court. The man said he was driving in the area when a woman started to honk at him and “yell obscenities regarding a bumper sticker he had.”
Court records show the man tried to wave the woman — later identified as Blair — around him but she followed him and threw a water bottle at his vehicle at a red light. The man told police he became frightened and accidentally reversed into Blair’s vehicle trying to drive away.
The man said “due to the crash” he pulled into the Walgreens to exchange insurance information and an “extremely irate” Blair pulled out a gun and “racked the slide,” according to police. He told police he then backed away and called 911 “in fear that she was going to shoot him.”
The man showed a video of the incident to police where Blair can be seen pulling out a gun and loading the chamber. Police said Blair told them she began to honk at the man after she saw the man’s “vaccinated” bumper sticker.
She said she threw a water bottle at his vehicle, he reversed into her and the pair got into an argument in the Walgreens parking lot, according to the complaint. Blair told police she pulled out a gun “during the argument” and she was scared because the man blocked her from driving away.
“Through the course of my investigation, I was able to determine that (Blair) did have an opportunity to leave … but instead overtly reached into her vehicle and retrieved a handgun threatening (the man),” the officer wrote.
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