Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1888-08-18 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

THE MYSTERIOUS MURDER IN MADRID.  EXTRAORDINARY PRISON  REVELATIONS.  The secret of the mysterious crime which five weeks ago threw lgadnd into such a state of excitement seems to have been discovered, and it implicates the prison authorities of that city to the gravest extent. It will be remembered that after midnight on July Ist smoke was noticed issuing from a i house n the Celia de Fuencarral, where the neighbours had heard unusual noises. The imam was entered, and in the front room was discovered the body of a wealthy widow, about 55 years of age, who hal been stabbed to death. The assassins had also tried to burn the body by heaping clothes on the lower limbs and pouring petroleum over them. The fire had charred and disfigured the lower part of the body, but had died out, leaving intact the chest and neck, which bore the marks of stabs. Nothing in the room had been dieLimbed, and none of the valuables taken away. In another room the search party found a female servant and a bull dog and the servant declared her ignorance and innocence of the crime. She was apprehended, and for a whole fortnight nearly drove the Judge and the police distracted with her varying coufereions,and at one time saying she alone had killed her mistress, and then saying the deed had been committed by eome men. Then she accused the deceased's son Varela, who was in prison at the time, of having done the deed, affirming that the latter was let out of prison on the fetal night. as he had frequently been before. When asked why she did not state this at first she said she had been induced to make her first statements by the governor of the prison, who wished to conceal his veniality. The governor wad now arrested, and when confronted with his accuser he flew at her threat and tried to throttle her. After five days investigation he was set at liberty, but suspended from his function. At length an inferior official turned informer, and then it was discovered that, like other prisoners, joe4 Varela went in and out of his Majesty:. prison by day and night, in disguise or in plain clothes, by the ordinary door or by a aids passage through the political department. He had been out all the afternoon and night of July 1, and had returned to prison at 4 am. on July 2 in a state of semlintoxication, though he had been allowed to have as a companion one of the  prison officials. It was alsO learnt from the official who made this confession that Varela,. on returning to the prison ball intoxicated, had told one fellow-prisoner, who was sweeping his cell that his mother was badly hen and not likely to live lone. To another person in the prison on the same night he had distinctly declared that he had been mad enough to kill his mother. The judge at once ordered Varela and the other prisoners arrested on suspicion of being his accomplices, to be transferred to cells of close confinement. said he issued warrants for the apprehension of seven warden and officials on duty on July 1 and 2. Last but not kast he issued a warrant for the arrest of the ex-governor. As he thought he could not trust him to the care of his old subordinates, he obtained the permission of the Captain-General of Madrid to send him to the military prison in the old Convent of San Francisco.  Tns Rssurss OF Ltairse obi •