The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-03-17
GLOVE IS CLUE ID
 ASSASS|N'S RUIN How Detectives Cleverly
 Traced the Crime A SPANIARD GUILTY Judge Announced That Circumstantial Evidence Was Such That There Could Be No Doubt
 of Guilt
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From the Saturday Evening Post

From the Saturday Evening Post
 Perhaps the greatest aid to the solu- tion to the mystery of Identities, and per haps the most efficient weapon that modern scientific methods have placed
 in the hands of'the courts is the ldenti- fication by finger prints.
 One would say that to avoid this ieop- ardy the criminal would need only to wear gloves when he went about his work But il was the very fact. that one of the assassins wore gloves that led 10 the detection of the criminal agents in one of the most extraordinary cases reported in New York. People vs. Gonzalez, s5 N. r. 4s.l
 A spaniard named Otero, on his way from Havana to New York, fell in with oountryrnan named Gonzalez. otero was a young, frank, good-natured fel- low, and as Gonzalez seemed to be an unfortunate person of his own country he took up and eyinced a friendly in terest in him. When they arrived in New York Gonzalez went with Otero 10 the Barcelona hotel in Great Jones street. which was known as the Spanish house
 The proprietors of this hotel were not pleased with the appearance of Gonzalez and as he came without baggage, they refused him a room. However, upon the intereession of Otero he was finally per n1ltted to enter.
 Otero said that Gonzalez was B poor fellow whom he was going to help, who had come to New York for employment Otero seemed to be very prosperous person: he exhibited considerable sums of gold that he carried about him The clerk at the hotel advised him to de. posit his monew in the hotel safe but he declined 10 take this precauton. 1t was afterward remembered that Gonzalez watched the movements of Otero with the keenest interest and constantly at- tended him.
 It was also remembered that within an hour after their arrival at the Barce- Iona Gonzales went to the Hotel de Cuba in Bleecker street little more than A block from Great Jones street. and there met with another Spaniard named PelIl- cier. who had been a former walter al the Barcelona hotel Soon after his ar rival Otero left for Philadelphia and did not return to New York until the follow ing Tuesday. At 9.30 70 clock Wednesday night 1t happened that William (. Mills, or Brooklyn. left his shop in Fulton street, 10 go To his residence in Cannon place. and in the center of the park he discovered the body of Otero. The police were notified and came immediately. They concluded that as the body was still warm the assassins had been interrupted by the approach of Mills and had not completed their work of robbng the body.
 One of the pockets Of Otero was turned inside out, but another was left undis- turbed, although It contained over s2oo I .n-- .g.-a 1-t.. Kf |. Barcelona hoteI, by which he was al once identified. In the haste of their flight the murderers had dropped their implements and the police found a bent dagger and the detached blade of a razors These weapons could not be lden- tified and did not indicate the criminals, but fortunately on the ground near by the police picked up pair of bloody gloves When they came to examine these gloves they found that the left one had been cut.
 As the gloves did not fit Otero the po- been worn by one of the assassns, and been worn hv one of the assassins, and they constructed the following theory As Otero was an athletic and vigorous man he had evidently been surprised and overpowered and as there were two ini- plements found it was reasonable 10 conclude that there had been two assas- sins.
 As the most deadly wounds were stabs in the back the police concluded that the assassin who had worn the gloves had clutched Otero with his left hand while he applied his dagger from behind, and that the bolder assassin while gashing otero in front with his razor Inadvertently cut the gloved hand of his confederate. The police had now a clew to the assas- sins. They had only to find man with a gashed left hand. As the victim was Spaniard they began at once 10 visit those holels and boarding houses to which Spaniards were accustomed to re- sort in New York. and they immediately picked ID Pelicier and Gonzalez. When Pellicier was taken to the station house the glove was put on his hand and the cuts in it were found to correspond with the cuts in the fingers of his left hand. The Judge said in his opinion:
 "In the light Of his evidence, undis- puted and unexplained the crime they committed in darkness is as clearly open 10 view as if they had perpetrsted lt in the blaze of the monday. The case fur nishes single illustration Of the searcn- ing nature and the irresistible force Of cIrcumstantlal evidence in the detection and exposure of secret guilt. So far as hun,an sagacity could foresee the per petrators of the crime were secure of ab- solt1te immunity. They had no thought when they were compa ssing Oteros death that they were lifting their hands against their own lives. but. step by step, as they were logging him. retribution was following unseen close upon the heels Of the criminals.