POLICE AND CRIME
METHODS IN AMERICA. . ’EX-DETECTIVE’S IMPRESSIONS. Ex-CJiief Detective Herbert, who iii his young days was stationed as a detective at Wellington and Auckland, and later was chief detective at Dunedin and Christchurch, has returned to Dunedin r after spending eight years abroad. Of America, Mi\ Herbert drew a very bright picture. “Business is booming there,” he said, “and the people are wonderful in the way they get things done. If they decide to erect a bridge costing a million or waterworks costing ten millions, they will find the moifey and get it done. There is a marvellous degree of prosperity in evidence everywhere.”
Mr. Herbert was diffident about expressing an opinion on police matters in America!' “I am satisfied their methods would never do out here,” he said. “There is too much gum work. I have actually seen squads of men sent down by their chiefs to round up bandits with instructions to ‘shoot first and inquire afterwards.’ The whole system of justice is wrong in America. It would bo very much better if it were run on English lines. It would be utterly impossible for some of the tilings that happen in' America, to occur in England. Why, everybody carries a gun there. All the young fellows have one.”. Mr. Herbert made a passing allusion to the prevalence of crime nowadays,' and said the problem was ' becoming serious in England, where a large number of major offences remained undetected. In America, of course, it was far worse, and the worst place in America was Chicago. There were more murders committed in Chicago, with its population of two millions, than were committed in five years in the whole of England, with its population of 40 millions. American newspapers were inclined to make a hero of tile criminal. Ho was interviewed, and his (wife was interviewed, and all the “sob stuff” possible was published. It panjeued to the tastes of the neurotic section of the community, which sought excitement in sensational crimes.
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Bibliographic details
Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16534, 29 December 1927, Page 3
Word Count
333POLICE AND CRIME Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16534, 29 December 1927, Page 3
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