The great escape from an Albuquerque jail to Valencia County, 1928

Valencia County has long served as a preferred escape route for convicts attempting to flee from city and county jails and the state penitentiary in northern New Mexico. Many escapees sought to secure their freedom by fleeing through Valencia County to destinations farther south, especially Mexico.

Escapees used many forms of transportation as they fled through Valencia County. While most traveled by foot, others used stolen horses, getaway cars and even a rented helicopter that landed in Mid-Valley Airport in 1988.

In probably New Mexico’s largest single breakout, 11 prisoners achieved a sensational escape from the Bernalillo County Jail in the early morning hours of Friday, April 6, 1928. To no one’s surprise, several of the escapees fled south to Valencia County.

The great escape

Two jailers, Primitivo Candelaria and Isidro Lopez, were on duty guarding 40 prisoners in the Bernalillo County Jail on that spring morning in 1928. Suddenly, one of the prisoners managed to steal Candelaria’s revolver and use it to hit the jailer on the back of his head.

Brandishing Candelaria’s gun to keep the second jailer at bay, ring leaders secured the jail’s keys, locked Candelaria in a cell and released all those willing to join them in a break. Escapees may well have believed that the more men who escaped, the harder it would be for lawmen to track them down and return them to jail.

It was commonly believed that two notorious criminals instigated the escape. Nicknamed “The Cat,” 23-year-old Manuel Gonzales had already served a sentence in the New Mexico state penitentiary and had managed to escape from the city jail in Santa Fe by sawing through its bars and creating a hole large enough for him to crawl through.

Authorities believed that Jack Cates was the second instigator of the April 6 escape. Described in the press as “well-groomed” and a “smooth talker,” Cates used several aliases in the check forgery “business” he operated in Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Las Vegas and other towns of the Southwest.

He had served time in Wyoming, Kansas and Arkansas and was on parole from the Colorado state penitentiary when he was arrested in Albuquerque weeks before the big escape.

The 11 escapees varied in age from 19 to 35. Cates was the oldest — at least two were 19. Six were Hispanic and five were Anglo. Their crimes ranged from forgery, burglary, car theft and the transport of stolen vehicles to simple vagrancy and the possession of alcohol.

Escapees had previously served terms in state penitentiaries in Texas, Colorado, New Mexico and San Quentin, Calif. With the exception of Gonzales, who still carried Candelaria’s gun, none were considered violent.

Fleeing south

Once free from the Bernalillo County Jail, several escapees managed to steal a car and head south. In a clever ruse, one reportedly called the telephone company pretending to be a lawman. He instructed an operator to shut down all calls going out from Albuquerque.

If successful, no calls would be made to warn towns in Valencia County and beyond. The deception did not work. Los Lunas, Belen and other nearby communities were quickly put on the alert via telephone.

While some of the escapees were captured within hours, four others, including Jack Cates, began a crime spree that included stealing a car and robbing a store of food, cigarettes and other small items.

Bernalillo County Sheriff Phillip Hubbell and several of his deputies tracked the fugitives south to the Isleta bridge. Shots were fired but no one was hit, and the car sped on.

Meanwhile, Valencia County Sheriff Jesus Gallegos and his men scoured rural Valencia County, achieving some success when they found the car the escapees had stolen but then abandoned along the road.

The escapees later told of walking along the same road, running for cover whenever they heard approaching vehicles or saw headlights coming from either direction.

One prisoner had escaped with no time to put on his shoes. After going barefoot for several miles, he improvised with pieces of rubber he found along the way. He used wire to tie the primitive sandals to his feet.

The capture

Officers from the state penitentiary quickly transported two bloodhounds south to help in the search. Delivered in Valencia County, the dogs picked up scents and led officers over two miles on foot, first to the river bank and then to the Santa Fe railroad tracks. The hounds were then brought to the Rio Grande east of Belen. Despite their best efforts, the dogs found no clues of value.

Passing through Los Lunas to take the bloodhounds back to the prison in Santa Fe, deputies finally received the tip they had been hoping for. A ranch hand told them he had seen four strangers enter an abandoned adobe shack on the Harlan Ranch, two miles south of Los Lunas.

At 7 p.m., Saturday, April 7, five deputies found the shack, ironically near where the Honor Farm is located today. The lawmen burst through the building’s boarded door and window to gain entry.

The deputies found Jack Cates and three other escapees sitting around a small fire inside. The men had boarded up the shack’s door and window to prevent smoke from exiting and giving away their location. By the time the police barged in with drawn weapons, the smoke was almost suffocating.

Unarmed, the escapees surrendered without incident. Their small taste of freedom had lasted only a day and a half.

A second attempt

Deputies took the captured escapees back to the county jail in Albuquerque. Two men were kept in each of two cells. Three other escapees were already confined in other cells by the time the four arrived from Valencia County.

Before long, jailers discovered that someone had written a rather long narrative on a cell wall. The account described the bold escape and capture, naming the four men who were still on the run and expressing the “hope they are never caught.” Jailers suspected that Cates was the author of this chronicle and expression of hope.

The captured escapees found less productive ways to spend their time back in jail. On the eve of the prisoners’ arraignment, Primitivo Candelaria and a fellow guard heard a loud pounding sound on the walls.

Investigating, the jailers found that the four men confined in two adjacent cells were attempting to dig their way out through their cell walls using a small pocket knife and a bolt removed from one of their bunks.

The men shared the tools by passing them back and forth between their cells. Two of the men had made good progress; the other pair had seemingly just begun their labor.

It was obvious that the four were attempting a desperate dash to freedom before they were formally charged of their new crimes. It was not clear who had provided the pocket knife, no less how they had gotten it to the men in jail.

Their fates

When finally arraigned and put on trial, most of the escapees pleaded not guilty. They were found guilty at trial and were sentenced to an additional four years beyond the sentences they had received for their original crimes.

When one escapee was arrested on burglary charges in Phoenix, he foolishly told a cellmate about his role in the mass breakout in Albuquerque. The cellmate turned him in.

Manuel Gonzales received the harshest punishment. Accused of not only escaping from jail but also stealing Candelaria’s weapon, assaulting him with a deadly weapon and illegally confining him in a cell, Gonzales pleaded guilty to his crimes and received a 25-year sentence, the minimal sentence he could receive for a crime whose sentence could be as long as 50 years in the state penitentiary.

In 1932, Gov. Arthur Seligman reduced Gonzales’s sentence to 8 1/2 years. Two months later, the convict broke a prison rule. His original sentence was reinstated.

Only escapee Demetrio Fajardo remained at large. With no evidence of his whereabouts, his case remained first on the Albuquerque court docket until as late as 1944. Newspapers never reported his capture, and it is likely that he had crossed into Mexico, changed his identity or died.

Three ways unusual

Three things made the April 6 escape unusual among breakouts in the crime-riddled 1920s.

First, the escape required so little planning that it was not revealed and frustrated before it took place. Second, it involved a large number of escapees. And, most fortunately, no one was injured or killed in the escapees’ capture.

The people of Valencia County played an important role in ending the fugitives’ great escape. Long before the invention of high-tech search equipment, Valencians cast a wide net to bravely apprehend four of the 11 escapees in what likely remains the largest jail breakout in New Mexico history.

(La Historia del Rio Abajo is a regular column about Valencia County history written by members of the Valencia County Historical Society since 1998.

The author appreciates the assistance of Cynthia Shetter, who first informed him of this memorable escape by sharing a front page article about it from an Albuquerque newspaper.

Opinions expressed in this and all columns of La Historia del Rio Abajo are the author’s alone and not necessarily those of the Valencia County Historical Society or any other group or individual.)