THE CRIMINAL.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11508, 2 October 1915, Page 7

THE CRIMINAL.

WHAT TO DO WITH HIM. AN INTERNATIONAL PROBLEM. I The problem of crime is international, but its solution is both racial and local. I The Chinese deal with their criminals j by cutting off their heads and placing them on long poles in the sight of all J people, to serve as a warning. In France, the guillotine still serves the ends of justice, and it was not so very long ago in America that, when a man committed a crime, the only logical sequence seemed to be to shut him between four prison walls, and—forget him. But a strong note of progress in this direction has been sounded. Preventive, rather than punitive, methods are coming into play. THE SOURCE. The root of the vast network of crime is considerd by most prison reformers to lie in juvenile delinquency. F. Grossen, director of the correctional school of Berne, Switzerland, says: " The public authorities ought energetically to combat the habit of children roving about the streets- I do not hesitate to say that the increase in juvenile crime bears a direct relation to the fact that so many married women work in factories; that the children are not prowrly cared for and watched over. The reports of educational institutions for reform show that the majority of juvenile delinquents come from cities which are industrial centres." PRINCIPLE OF PUMSHMENT. •'The principle maintained by Caesar linccaria,"' says A. Stoppano, of University of Bologna, Italy, "was that one of the checks to crime should not be the cruelty of' punishment but the certainty of its .application. The r>riuciple that punishment in its application should look to the moral improvement of the culprit is of social importance, and the mitigation of penalties for certain offenders and making them sharper for habitual criminals is a truly social duty. It is certain—long experience has demonstrated it—that short sentences applied without distinction to juvenile delinquents and first offenders for certain kinds of misdemeanours, have not always produced good results, either as measures of prevention or repression." P. Grimanelli, Minister of the Interior, Prison Society of Paris, advocates the appointment of probation officers, similar to those of America. He says : "If one asks what thing marks the greatest progress in the United States in the last five years in judicial methods and principles, one would reply without hesitation, the creation of courts for children."' ABNORMAL CHILDREN.

" No country has thus far made provision for the abnormal children who manifest dangerous moral tendencies," says Daniel Phelan, M.D., surgeon, Dominion Penitentiary, Kingston, Canada. " There should be special institutions for these. Children received into them should receive education suited to their mental condition. All diseases or imperrections demanding surgical measures should be looked after. The correction of all these evils may improve the disposition and temper of the children, and they may thus be prevented from developing a tendency to commit criminal acts as the results of fits of passion." THE VAGABOND. At the extreme end of the long procession of criminals stand the vaga-

bonds, forty per rent of whom have a court record. "Tho aetiology of vagabondage is convex," says L. Vervaock, physician of the prison, Brussels. "It is useless to spend so much money in reforming vagabonds and beggars if we leave them without moral support when they are released and thrown back into the common life. Only those should be released who are capable of self-sup-port. The infirm should go to hospitals, pub'ic or private. The incorrigible ebauld go to workhouses. The man who means to regain his place in society shou'd be placed in a shop or factory and intrusted to someone who will look after him, a member of a guardian society. It will be his duty to follow the man, to counsel him, to stand by him in his trials, and to inspire him with self-respect' and courage, that he may persevere in the hard road he has to

follow to regain lus lost place in tlio community."