The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1913-11-19
"Coises! Where's Them Papers,
Conspirafor Leads a Gay Life
MexiCOS Police Real Sleuths

AFA 1%<NO ~ Il OLtCC
1.-THE life of a correspondent in Mex
leo City is not what it is cracked up
10 be. War correspondents and MeXi-
can correspondents are synonymous
Despite the fact that a Mexican cor
respondent never knows at Just what
moment he is liable to be thirty
threed' which means being fred out
of the country. after an unpleasant and
dang erous experience in Mexican jails,
Mexico City correspondent has been
able to see the houmor of the situa-
! ton as it exists today in the turbulent
| Latin-American republcan-Editor'
note. ].
| MEXICO CITY, Nov. 19.-The first
thing a Mexican does when he be-
! comes conspirator or Joins a rebel
Junta or apprentices himself to learn
the trade OF banditry, or gets into the
plotters union, is to supply himself
with discriminating documents No
conspirator against the provisional
| government of Citizen General Lon
| Victoriano Huerta, presidente INFERNO
constitutional of the United States OF
Mexico, is recognized as plotter in
good standing unless he carries them
papers" on his person
| When man is initiated into a cir
Icle of Carrancista or apatista of Vaz-
Quista or some other "ista" conspira-
tors, he takes a terrible oath never to
reveal the secrets of the order, even
! though he be put to slow torture. Then
signs and passwords are given him
and a large bunch of discriminating
documents is cOnfided TO his care. The
documents" may differ in detail, but
!
addresses OF all the conspirators and
full expose of their nefarious plans and
projects, with diagrams.
All Carry Documents.
All the conspirators carry these doc
uments in their breast pockets when
they wear coats, and in the pistol
pockets of their trousers when they
don't. Sometimes-but this is very
rare-they leave the discriminating
documents in their Office desks or ly-
ing on their bureaus at home
Some of the members OF the cham
Der of deputies who were arrested by
order Of President Huerta October 10
for conspiracy against his government,
carelessly left their discriminating doc
uments in their desks in the chamber,
instead of carrying them IN their peck
cts according to custom, thus putting
the secret police to a great deal of
unnecessary trouble to get the papers
President Huerta called all the mem
bers Of the diplomatic corps to the ma
tional palace and told them in an
aggrieved ton how those tell-tale pa
pers had been found in the deputies
desks by the police. He really was
very angry about it. for, as he and
every one knows, it is the correct
thing in the best plotting circles to
carry such papers on the person,
where the secret police can get at
them without vsXatious delay and
trouble. There can be little doubt
that the imprisoned deputies will get
much severer sentences than they
would have received had they not ma
hciously sought to annoy the police
and cause delay by leaving these in
eliminating documents in their desks.
instead of carrying them to Jail, where
they could be found without trouble
when the deputies We're searched.
/ Secret Police Busy.
Day after day week after week, and
month after month conspirators of all
sorts and conditions have neen arrest
ed by the secret police of Mexico. sand
there is hardly a case on record where
discriminating documents were not
found when the prisoners were search
ed. The police said so, and the DO
lice ought to know, for they are the
ones who did the searching. There
have been some few executions to the
rule, but the conspirator upon whom
no discriminating papers were found US
ually had excuses to offer for their re-
missness, saying that they had
changed their clothes hurriedly and
had forgotten to take the documents
out of their other pockets, or they
had left them absent mindedly at
home on the piano, or had lent them
to conspirator friend, or a pick
pocket had filched them The police
regard such stories with a good deal
of distrust and sometimes strongly sus-
pect that those telling them are not
conspirators at all, but only miserable
creatures posing as such and trying
to pass as plotters in good standing
without having the necessary creden-
tials
Sometimes a conspirators' band is
organized in the penitentiary among
the prisoners and they have a great
deal of trouble to provide themselves
with enough discriminating documents
to go around, for paper and pens and
ink are difficult to obtain in prison.
There have been violent ouarrels be-
cause Of this scarcity of discriminating
documents in such cases, those with
out any complaining bitterly at the I'M
just discrimination which left them
paperless.
. Occasionally the police or the sol
| diers have given chase to a suspect in
the open country and have pressed
him so hard that the poor fellow has
been obliged to throw away his arms
and ammunition and discard his cloth