EXPERT BURGLARIES

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 August 1934, Page 3

EXPERT BURGLARIES

BY SLEEPING BOY A remarkable case of a boy of eleven, who committed a series of expert burglaries in his sleep, was described by Prof. A. E. Heath, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Swansea, when lecturing on psychology at the Summer School of the British Social Hygiene Council at Digswell Park, Welwyn, recently. “I had brought to my notice the case of a boy of eleven, who was very bright and very clever with his hands,” he said. “One day the police called on his mother because there had been a number of shop burglaries in the locality. The burglaries were very neat and the methods used unlike any of those used by known burglars. “The finger prints turned out to be those of a young boy, and the police went to the local school and made inquiries in the various classes.

“When the police questioned the boy he said, ‘Yes, I didn’t do them, but I dreamed all about them.’ He had been sleep-walking, a habit of which his parents were well aware. He had got up and done the jobs in his sleep with some tools used for his work at school.”