Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1893-01-28
WHOLESALE ARRESTS,
A., r. & S. f. Railroad Employees from
La Junta to Albuquerque In
vOlved in a Gigantic
Conspiracy.
Startling Stolen Plumber
Recovered-The Guilty Confess
and Involve Many
Persons.

On yesterday there were arrested in
Colorado and New Mexico about fifty
employees of the Atchison, Topeka and
Santa Fe railroad company. The charges
preferred are burglary and grand larceny
and the proof against those arrested is
conclusive of their guilt. Secret service
men have been engaged in ferreting out
these robberies for the past six months
and the elimination of their efforts was
reached yesterday with the result as
above. So positive is the evidence of the
guilt of those arrested that number of
the engineers and trainmen
CONFESSED THEIR GUILT
to officers of the company Immediately
after the making of the arrests at La
Junta and Trinidad. For months freight
cars have been systematically rifed and
the loss to the company has been enor-
nous. Cases of dress goods, silks, sat
ms, hats, suits of clothes, whiskeys, cigars,
butter, eggs, and merchandise of every
kind have been stolen and sold to vari.
Gus people in the principal cities of Colo
RADIO and New Mexico south of La Junta.
THE CONSPIRACY
involves some of the heretofore consid-
cred trustiest employees of the company.
Men whose records and salaries were of
that grade as to almost guarantee their
honesty. The conspiracy was not alone
confined to railroad men but extended to
shop and saloon keepers in business
principally at the ends of divisions. The
company made no positive move in the
premises until it was in possession of the
full facts in the cases. The evidence is
beyond question of the most convincing
character. Employees houses were searched
and large quantities of
THE GOODS RECOVERED.
In one instance conductor was caught
wearing a black silk shirt, being one of two
dozen Of the same kind found at his resi-
dence. One saloon in Ration has been al
most entirely supplied with liquors and
cigars stolen by employees. In Las We
gas and Ration restaurants have been the
recipients of butter, eggs and canned
goods, the fruits of this far-reaching
conspiracy to rob the company. Never
in the history of railroading has there
been unearthed such systematic
SCHEME FOR PLUMBER.
The prominence in railroad circles of
those who have been arrested, their high
position in the different labor organiza-
tions, their social status in the commune
ties in which they live, has dumbfounded
the officials of the company. SO wide
spread has been this cons piracy that the
railroad officials have been almost para
lyzed by the proofs gathered and the
revelations and confessions made by those
arrested. These confessions involve
many other employees who up to the time
of the arrests
HAD NOT BEEN sUsPICIONED
and against whom there had been no con-
elusive proofs. ....
Within few days and at the proper
time other arrests will be made which
will startle the whole territory.
The unraveling of these crimes has been
done by the most prominent secret SER
vice men in the country, and SO quiet has
been the work that even the local officers
in New Mexico knew nothing of it, every
thing having been managed from head
quarters. The excitement at La Junta,
Trinidad, Ration and Las Vegas has been
intense and is not confined to railroad
men. Over dozen men have been ar
rested for receiving and concealing stolen
goods and in many cases the service of
search warrants has brought to light large
quantities of stolen property. The evil
dence in the hands of the territorial pro-
scouting officers is SO certain that there is
NO ESCAPE FOR THE ouLPR1rs.
The exact time, the specific property
stolen, the place and all of the circum-
are in the possession of the dis
trict attorneys and the trials will be
watched with interest. In the arrests
made in Colorado, there will probably be
but few trials as nearly all of the men
have made full confessions. In New
Mexico the trials will be had OF Springer,
Las Vegas and Albuquerque, and rail-
road men generally throughout the United
States will watch their outcome with
great interest.