INTELLECTUALLY HANDICAPPED

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 28002, 23 June 1956, Page 4

INTELLECTUALLY HANDICAPPED

Relationship With Grime NEED FOR GUIDANCE “The Press" Special Service WELLINGTON, June 22. A “tremendous amount of woolly thinking” about the relationship of intellectual capacity and crime was discussed by Mr G. L. McLeod, speaking to the Wellington Church of England lunch club. Mr McLeod holds the degrees of M. 8., Ch. B.. and LL.B. After holding a commission in the Royal Army Medical Corps in India he did post-gradu-ate study in England before serving in the corps throughout World War II and rising to the rank of colonel. After the war he was medical officer of health at Timaru and at Wellington and became Assistant Director, Division of Hospitals in 1950. In 1953, he was admitted as a barrister and is now in a Wellington firm of barristers and solicitors. He served on the commission on juvenile delinquency which sat in 1954.

Mr McLeod said that the term “intellectually handicapped” was a modern expression for what used to be called “mentally defective.” People so classified could be put in three categories: The idiot, who could do nothing for himself; the imbecile, who could do simple tasks and the feebleminded, who was not quite up tc normal standard.

“Feeble-minded people were the type he considered most interesting from the crime point of view because they were the most difficult to recognise. People in authority were sometimes foxed by individuals who were able to make facile conversation but lacked the capacity to reason things out.

“Sometimes they are rated with far more intelligence than they have got and not sufficient excuse is made for them.’’

Mr McLeod said that intellectuallyhandicapped people should be given as much help as possible. Often they could be guided into activities where they would do well. “It behoves us to understand the problem, help them and try to provide the environment in which they can be as useful as possible.” he said.