Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1896-12-17
CHAVEZ Y CHAVEZ CASE.
Convicted second Time Of Murder
in the First Degree-Sentence Of
Judge Smith-AnOtherA Appeal.

Second only IN interest TO tne borrego
murder trial of this county may be
classed the trial of Jose Chavez y Chavez
for murder in the first degree in San
Miguel county. The defendant was con-
victed at a former term of the district
court at Las Vegas OF a most fiendish
murder, appealed to the territorial su-
preme court; the judgment of the court
below was reversed and the case was re-
manded for new trial. Since then the
defendant has had new trial, has again
been convicted of murder in the first de-
gree, been sentenced to be hanged, and
again appeals to the supreme court. Fol-
lowing is the sentence of Judge Smith:
Jose Chavez Chavez: By a jury of
your peers you have been convicted for
the second time of the crime of murder
in the first degree, for having, in cruel
and inhuman manner, taken away the
life of Gabriel Sandoval.
In the minds of those, whom the noto-
riety of your crime has familiarized with
the facts of the case, there exists no
doubt of the justice of the verdict
Twice found guilty, after having been
ably defended by counsel almost too
Jealous in their efforts to reduce the
degree of the enormity of your crime, it
would seem to be almost prostitution
of the law to delay the punishment which
your fellow citizens, in solemn delibera-
ton, have pronounced upon you. But
it is to be presumed that an outraged
community, in irremedial apprehension,
must await the result of second attempt
to obtain for you another opportunity to
escape the penalty which your infamy
deserves. One court out of excess OF
tenderness humanity granted you new
trial, not because it entertained any sus-
picion that you had not participated in
the murder, but because in the first trial
of your case your counsel we're not
permitted to attack the character of
the witnesses against you further than
to show that they were your accomplices
in your terrible crime. And, encouraged
by such consideration, doubtless there
will be another appeal to discover
whether or not the facts may not again
be overcome by some technicality. Not
having denied your guilt, except under
the guise of your plea, and we'll knowing
your connection, as principal, with the
assassination of an innocent friend, it
was to be hoped that, in the agony of re-
morse, you would prefer death to life
of persecution by the ghost of your vic
tim. But, Notwithstanding your cruelty
to your victim, you manifest great anxi-
ETY. that your life may be saved, a menace
to the people whose sensibilities you have
affected with indescribable horror. It
can not be possible that such a murder
can remain UNPUBLISHED, and it is to be
hoped that sooner or later the ma esty of
the law will be maintained in the intlic-
ton of the penalty which is prescribed
for such crime.
Yon did not allow Sandoval to return
to the dust from which he was created,
but his body was conveyed to this ilthiest
place imaginable-a place where the
most savage barbarians never would have
deposited one of their victims in view of
the horror such an act would have occa-
stoned. But you, nevertheless, will be
solemnly executed and your body will
receive decent burial, in order to give
awful warning to all wrong-doers that
crime, no matter how secretly it may
have been committed, will at last come to
light, and the perpetrators will receive
the establishment which they merit.
The court condemns you to death, and
commands that you be executed by the
sheriff of this county at some place in
the city of Las Vegas on the 1st day Of
January, 1897, between the hours of 10
m. and p. m.