Four more convicts made their escape…
source date: 1891
availability: public-domain

more convicts made their escape from the territorial penitentiary at Santa Fe on Monday last. It was at 4 o’clock in the after- noon when the break was made, and four horses at work in the brick yard were captured, the convicts holding up the drivers with wooden pistols. The guards seemed paralyzed with fear, but after the convicts had gotten out of the enclosure, one of the guards fired and winged James Gould, who was recently re- captured on the Sapello and returned to the pen. Gould’s horse became frightened and threw him, and his capture was effected. The break was made by the notorious Lee White, who with Petronilo Rivera and Francisco Pa- dilla succeeded in making good their escape. Their capture could have been effected easily, even after they had gotten beyond the enclo- sure, had the guards shown the slightest dili- gence. The penitentiary board was in session at the time, and the members were eye-wit- nesses to the escape. Colonel Chaves, the war- den, almost immediately resigned, and a new warden will be appointed. The three men who escaped are all vicious scoundrels. White was in for seven years for robberies and hold-ups in south Santa Fe county; Padilla murdered his wife at Socorro, and Rivera was in for a heinious crime — he cut a man’s throat in Dona Ana county and afterwards disemboweled his victim; both were in for life.