Boy murderers

Father Demand Death Penalty

Evening Post

September 18, 1929

Paris, 17th September. "Gentlemen of the Jury, perform your duty. I demand the death penalty for my boy," said a woodcutter at the trial of two lads, charged in the village of Digne, Provence, with murdering an entire family of five.

After seeking shelter in a farmhouse at night, Jules Ughetto and Stephen Mucha shot the farmer, his wife, two children, and a servant in cold blood.

The entire population of the country seethed with fury and vowed to apply the lynch law. The Court was guarded by forty mounted and seventy foot police.

The prosecutor informed the Judge that Mucha was five days under sixteen when they committed the murders, and was therefore ineligible for the death penalty.

Ughetto's father's Spartan plea was fullfilled. His son was sentenced to death and Mucha to a maximum of twenty years' imprisonment.

Jules Ughetto

The execution of Jules Ughetto, 19, in Digne-les-Bains on January 24, 1930.