Arizona Republican

A MYSTERY.
A Mexican Found Hanging to a Tree—Was it Murder?

On Tuesday morning last a Mexican wood peddler, named Francisco Valencia, says the Nogales Herald, came into town and reported having found a man hanging to the limb of a tree in a small canon about two miles northwest of Nogales. Judge Cumming summoned a coroner's jury, and guided by the wood peddler went to the place. On arriving they found a man hanging from the limb of the tree by the neck, the rope used being a small one of hair. The feet rested on the ground, and the body was inclined at such an angle that when it was straightened up the slack of the rope came below the shoulders.

After viewing the surroundings the body was cut down, brought into town and an investigation held. The inquest showed that the dead man was named Arcadio Estrella, and that he had been working for William Barnett, of the Arizona ranch, in Sonora, for the last ten years. He had come to town on Tuesday, the 8th instant, and was seen that evening on the Sonora side, on horseback, with a bandage on his face. He told a woman that some men had beaten him, that he was going to be revenged and rode off. That was the last seen of him alive. The next morning his horse was found at the Mexican cemetery, saddled and bridled, the right stirrup broken and a cloth tied around the horn of the saddle, evidently the bandage that had been around his face. When he was found hanging to the tree there was a deep wound on the left side of the face, as though made with some sharp instrument. The evidence went to show that Estrella had been hanging where he was found a week, but owing to the cool weather decomposition had not set in. The only thing found in his pockets was an order from William Barnett on Theo. Gebler for some goods.

The position in which the body was found, the feet on the ground and inclined at an angle, makes it look more like a cold blooded murder than a suicide. There is only a faint clue as to the identity of the murderers.