The State - News from Dec. 25, 1985

A state Court of Appeal upheld the murder conviction of Leonardo Baca for his part in the 1974 reprisal killing of Union City Police Chief William Cann in a town meeting over police treatment of the Mexican-American community. The three-judge panel unanimously rejected a series of defense challenges of jury instructions. The court also rejected arguments that testimony of other alleged participants in the killing should have been limited or excluded. The justices also said there was no reversible harm by preventing the defense from using a witnesses’ past criminal record to attack the witnesses’ honesty. Baca was found guilty of second-degree murder March, 21, 1984, and sentenced to five years to life in prison. The time is to run consecutively to a sentence Baca was serving for a New Mexico offense.