ENRAGED MOB.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 65, 18 March 1938, Page 11

ENRAGED MOB.

MURDERER WANTED. TROOPS REPULSED ASSAULT. EXECUTION BY LAW OF FUGHT. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SAN FRANCISCO, Match 1. Just below the international border near San Diego, Southern California, the populace has recovered it- composure after one of the most momentous incidents in the history of the border town of Tijuana, Mexico. Sokheiv with machine puns and rifles formed a hollow square ahout the military prison wiiere a confessed child murderer cowered in his cell, guarding against renew?.' of a mob assault which earlier was repaired with bloodshed. Two boys and a man were killed and 14 person* were wounded or otherwise injured as troops fired into the mob of 1500 men and women that stonned the prison clamouring for the prison o -, who admitted slashing the throat of eight-year-old Olga Camacho. The mob, before ascertaining the prisoner's whereabouts, had first put the city hall and po.iee station to the torch in a frenzy of rage. Interiors of both adobe structures were destroyed by the flames. Fearing further violence, Mexican Custorns officers closed the international border at San Ysidro. allowing no foreigners enter the riot-torn town. A new flurry of excitement came late in the day when 200 civilians rescued Adrian Fcliz. editor of the powerful C.R.O.M. labour union newspaper, from two soldiers, who had arrested him and hurried him across the border into the U.S.A. The soldiers opened fire as several members of the rescue party bundled , Felix into an automobile and started driving to the border, but the bullets whizzed harmlessly over their heads. Furpose of the newspaperman's, arrest was unknown. To prevent a new mob from gathering, soldiers were stationed on strategic rooftops in the downtown district and the sharpshooters were heavily armed. Appeal to Cardenas. Answering an appeal from General Manuel Contreras, commandant of the local garrison, 30 soldiers were hurried there from Knsenada to reinforce the 50 troopers on duty. As a means of appeasing the mob's wrath, Contreras asked President Cardenas if he should surrender the prisoner to the angry citizenry, or order his execution within 48 hours. Contreras sought to placate citizens by assuring them in a radio broadcast that "the slayer of the Camacho girl will be punished to the fullest extent of the law." He also warned that "all rioters would be treated in a like manner." All stores and shops were closed as the would-be. lynchers returned to their homes after being dispersed by 200 rounds of bullets. Authorities emphasised that no martial law had been invoked. The dead were: Roman Maldonado, eight; Salvador Vasquez, 14; and Vidal Torres, 56. Authorities at the time refused to divulge the name of the prisoner they said had admitted the killing of the Camancho girl. He was a soldier, and his arrest followed discovery in the barracks .of a package of meat the. girl was tnkjng home when she was attacked and then killed with knife thrusts. The attack and murder took place in a garage behind the barracks. Dramatic Execution. Juan Carlos Morales. 24 years of age. whose brutal murder of the girl inflamed the border town to mob violence, died the death of a traitor in a gauntlet of gunfire in a hilltop cemetery in Tijuana. "La ley fuga"—the law of flight— was applied to the young soldier, and he: was cut down like a hunted deer as he tried to flee from two firing squads, from whom there was no escape. The execution was ordered by General Manuel Contreras. Commander of the Second Military Zone. Contreras, disregarding the Lower California law which sets up a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for murderers, ordered Morales taken from his cell two hours after dawn. Sensing the fate that awaited him. he accepted it calmly. "I am not afraid to die," lie told the guards, who flunpr him in a closed van and climbed in after him. But when the van reached the military cemetery , where a crowd had arathered. his nerve failed him. He began whimpering, fearing that he would be surrendered to the mob. The crowd, however, remained tensely silent and not a shout was raised. The captain of the guard ordered the frightened prisoner to alight. When he refused, soldiers dragged him from the van and march him to the far end of the cemetery, which overlooks Tijuana and the United States border beyond. At a word from the guards. Morales turned and started running. With a speed born of panic, he leaped one barbed wire fence and was hurdling a second before the first volley of shots , caught him —in the back. He dropped ', to his knees, staggered up and stumbled another 15 yards when another , fusillade was fired by the second firing , squad. He pitched forward on his face. > lay for a moment, and then made n i final attempt to regain his feet. His • puny effort was the signal for the third i volley and he rolled over and lay still. One soldier stepped forward, pressed ■ the muzzle of his revolver apainst the • slayer's forehead and administered the i "coup rle grace." Scattered' cheers arose I from the crowd as a physician pro- [ nounced him dead. It was one of the most dramatic sequels to outraged [ humanity in Mexico's border annals.