Juan Corona: The Machete Killer

Juan Corona was a Mexican-born labor contractor operating in the Yuba City area of California who murdered 25 migrant farm workers and buried their bodies in shallow graves in a peach orchard in 1971. The discovery of the first body on May 19, 1971 launched one of the largest murder investigations in California history up to that point. All victims were male itinerant laborers whom Corona hired for agricultural work. The victims were killed with a machete and a meat hook, and their graves contained receipts from Corona's business ledgers with crosses drawn on them, suggesting a ritualistic element to the burials. The physical evidence linking the killings directly to Corona was substantial — his name appeared in records found at burial sites, and witnesses placed him near the orchard on relevant dates. Corona was arrested in June 1971 and convicted in 1973 of all 25 murders, the largest mass murder conviction in United States history at the time. However, his trial was plagued by later allegations of grossly inadequate defense representation. His conviction was overturned on appeal on those grounds and he was retried in 1982, when a jury once again convicted him of all 25 counts after a lengthy trial. Corona always maintained his innocence, claiming his half-brother Natividad — who had a documented history of violence against young men — was the true perpetrator. He was denied parole repeatedly over the decades and died in prison in February 2019. His case drew lasting attention to the invisibility of migrant farm workers in the American legal system, as many of his victims went unreported missing for months before their identities could be established.