ESPAÑOLA — The pleas of a city like Española to let its vibrance shine through an exterior defined by suffering are known by few better than Ray Martinez.

“It’s just a lot a lot of pride and happiness,” said Martinez, a 71-year-old from Alcalde, as he ran his hand along the painstakingly maintained engine and pristine exterior of his white 1966 Chevrolet Impala lowrider, one of many parked alongside him in a town that in the 1980s declared itself the lowrider capital of the world.

“But the reality is we all live in a very hostile world,” he said.

Martinez looked to the mannequin skeleton in the driver’s seat of his car and the message he aimed to send by placing it there: “Don’t do drugs.”

He blamed drug use as the cause behind the high-profile slaying of his son Ricky Martinez and hig

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