Albuquerque Journal from Albuquerque, New Mexico • Page 18

B-6 ALBUQUERQUE JOURNAL Wednesday, November 2, 1983 Santa Fe Television Station On Air 27 Hours Late By LEAH BETH WARD And HOWARD HOUGHTON Journal Staff Writers SANTA FE KSAF TV 2 Santa Fe's first television station finally got on the air around 9 p.m. Monday night, 27 hours behind schedule, but just in time to relieve the mounting anxiety of owners and staff. The big moment arrived after repeated delays in the final hook-up at the transmission tower high in the Jemez Mountains. The delays pushed back a scheduled Monday air time of 6 p.m., already 24 hours behind the advertised goal of 6 p.m. Sunday.

But finally at 9:09 p.m., a television signal found its path between the station's broadcasting facility in a trailer on St. Michaels Drive and its transmitter on No Name Mountain. The signal was not immediately available on any of the cable television systems in the area, most of which are expected eventually to have to carry the new channel. However, receivers with antennas in Albuquerque reported the signal was strong, once it began. It was no small irony that the first broadcast was "2001: A Space Odyssey," for investors, managers, engineers, technicians and news people had traveled on an ody ssey of their own in order to bring the seven-year project to life.

When the five color bars and a "Hello New Mexico" flashed onto the television screen with full transmission power, a crew of anxious investors, staff and their families who had gathered at station headquarters burst into cheers and applause. "I feel good now. Each one of those bars is a million dollars," said president Joff Pollon. Tired and cold on the mountain top, Fred Wuenschel, the engineer in charge, radioed down: "Do we have it finally?" "It's beautiful Fred. Beautiful color.

We've got the color bars," said station general manager Al Lucero, who was hopping between the radio transmitter and the television set. Following him were owners Lee Brown and Charles Scanlan. "I've been on pins and needles all day," Lucero said earlier in the evening. Indeed, for every hour after 6 p.m., he had hoped for a signal only to be disappointed. They were still refining the microwaves or equalizing the signal.

After missing the Sunday sign-on, the station began airing apologies on local radio stations and promising to make good on Monday evening. "Hello, New Mexico: They're a day late but they're not a single program short," said the announcer in one taped announcement. "They had egg on their faces because they didn't get on the air Sunday, but they're going to try it again tonight." The problem, according to engineers and technicians, were delays in the final physical assembly at the tower site. Engineers could not work efficiently' in the dark. "Checking the lines for pressure is time consuming," said assistant chief engineer Massoud Salar-vard.

At one point in the evening, Lucero radioed to the transmitting engineers that they shouldn't respond to his queries "if it takes you away from getting us on the air. Please call only when you get a chance." Sales personnel said advertisers were miffed at the delay and would probably be compensated with free advertising time because commercials aired Monday night could not be expected to compete with ABC's Monday Night Football. At presstime, the station had plans to cancel its first newscast if it began to broadcast the movie any later than 9:30 p.m. The movie was simulcast in stereo with radio station KAFE-FM Santa Fe, which had been telling listeners to keep their fingers crossed throughout the evening. "Please do not call the station," the KAFE disc jockey said about 6:30 p.m.

"I have to keep all the lines open so I can talk to (KSAF) and bring you the movie." Angelo Buono Guilty Of Strangling Woman tup- 5 fox I rfA -and that LOS ANGELES AP) After the longest criminal trial in California history, a jury on Monday convicted Angelo Buono Jr. of one of the 10 Hillside Strangler slayings, and was told to continue deliberating on nine other murder charges. Buono, a 50-year-old auto upholsterer, was found guilty of killing Iauren Rae Wagner. She was the only victim whose abduction was witnessed by a neighbor, who testified at the trial. The jurors, who had been deliberating since Oct.

20, told Superior Court Judge Ronald George in advance that they had reached only one verdict and had no conclusion on the other counts. The judge ordered them to resume deliberations today, and to consider whether the murder verdict they already returned involved special circumstances, which could make Buono eligible for the death penalty. Buono, impassive throughout the trial, remained expressionless as the verdict was read. A key witness against him was his adoptive cousin, Kenneth A. Bianchi, who pleaded guilty to five of the slayings, but whose testimony was so erratic that prosecutors once tried to drop charges against Buono.

One of Buono's lawyers, Gerald Chaleff, said the defense team was "disappointed" in the verdict but "encouraged by the fact that the jury is deliberating on each verdict individually." He said any conviction "we intend to appeal." Miss Wagner, 18, a business college student from the Sepulve-da section of Ios Angeles, also worked part-time at a Granada Hills dime store. She was kidnapped near her parents' home the night of Nov 28, 1977, and was burned with an electrical cord before being strangled. Her body was found the next day along Cliff Drive in the Glassell Park section of I jus Angeles. In nearly all of the 10 slayings, which occurred in late 1977 and early 1978, the victim's nude bodies were dumped along Los Angeles-area hillsides. Most were raped or otherwise sexually assaulted before they were strangled.

The victims ranged in age from 12 to 28 and included some prostitutes solicited by telephone as well as an aspiring actress, students and others. The victims were picked up while hitchhiking or by men posing as police officers a fact that made real officers suspect to women made fearful by the Livings. Angelo Buono Jr. Jury Out on Nine Other Counts Bianchi, 32, a part-time security guard who wanted to be a policeman, was sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty Li October 1979 to five of the Los Angeles slayings and two others in Bellingham, Wash. He was spared the death penalty after agreeing to be a key witness against Buono.

Buono's case has been the longest criminal trial in California history, and some officials believed it was the longest in U.S. history as well. Before the jury got the case, the trial was in session 345 days over the nearly two-year period. There were 392 witnesses, 1,807 exhibits introduced into evidence and a trial transcript of nearly 56,000 pages. Court officials estimated the trial's cost to Ios Angeles County taxpayers at roughly $2 million.

Bianchi was on the witness stand SO days and vacillated considerably on both his and Buono's involvement in the crimes. His contradictory testimony prompted the Ijos Angeles County district attorney's office in July 1981 to seek to drop its case against Buono. But the judge refused to dimiss the charges. In his closing arguments. Deputy California Attorney General Roger Boren said Buono was motivated to kill because he liked "the ultimate humiliation and domination of women.

No sexual partner of Angelo Buono could satisfy that. It is how and why these women died." Tony Lucero To Face Trial For Murder in Cousin's Death Tr mmtm rrl, Call PSA Reservations at 247-2900 or your travel millo said at the time he lost track of the boy at a video Store. Michael's body was found Dec. 11, 1981, in Tijeras Canyon, and medical investigators reported after performing an autopsy that he had been hanged. Lucero was arrested Oct.

19 and booked in the city-county jail on an open charge of murder. He also was accused in a Metropolitan Court complaint with tampering with evidence. The witnesses Lucero allegedly intimidated, according to the indictment, are April Dee Jaramillo and Johnny Jaramillo, said to be the defendant's half-sister and half-brother. Ms. Jaramillo, 25, was booked into the city-county jail Oct.

21 on one count of perjury and later released on her own recognizance. Chief Deputy District Attorney Robert Schwart? declined late Monday to say if he win an" further indictments in the case. Police claimed in an arrest affidavit filed in Metropolitan Court that Lucero had been protected by members of his family during their 22-month investigation. US ANNE BURKS District Court Writer Tony R. Lucero of Albuquerque was indicted late Monday on an open charge of murder in the 1981 strangulation death of his 11-year-old cousin, Michael Padilla.

Lucero, 32, also was charged with tampering with evidence for allegedly concealing the child's body and with two counts of intimidating or threatening witnesses. The indictment was returned about 4 50 p.m. and filed in the state District Court's criminal division. The grand jury returned the indictment after hearing testimony by 10 witnesses in a proceeding that lasted several hours. It was the third county grand jury to consider the case.

Two 1982 grand juries declined to return indictments. Michael, who lived in Bernalillo, was reported missing by his foster mother, Stella Jaramillo, after a Dec. 2, 1981, shopping trip to Coronado Center with his cousin, Richard Jaramillo, then 27. Jara The airline that won theWest a Smile..