CRIME IN NAPLES.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VII, Issue 326, 18 July 1879, Page 17

CRIME IN NAPLES.

The Times correspondent writes from Naples under date May 5 :— » " I have too often been compelled to report the want of public security in this city, and yet I have been only acting on the statements and repeating the complaints of almost every journal in Naples. In fact, such is the absence of public security here that, unless things are greatly changed, intending visitors will do well to hesitate before they extend their visit so far south One of the most audacious assaults and thefts of which we have heard lately was committed on the persons of two Australian ladies residing in the Pensione Britannica, on the Corso Vittorio Emmanuele. They were walking on this well-know and beautiful road, ' when,' says the Pungolo, ' they were suddenly attacked by two unknown individuals. One la^y was thrown on the ground and robbed of a gold repeater with brilliants, of the value of £32, while from the other was taken a gold cylinder watch with gold chain, valued at £20.' Two guards in plain dress, who were making their rounds, immediately gave chase on hearing of the fact, and a spirited pursuit continued for some time. Rapidly descending from the heights into the Riviera di Chiaja, they jumped into a carrozzella on rinding that the guards gained upon them. The guards did the same, and after a hot chase succeeded in arresting them. The repeater was found on the person of one of them, and the cylinder watch, which had been thrown into a garden, was fortunately recovered. One of the thieves carried a revolver. An English gentleman now not far from me, a literary man of some eminence, has his tale to tell. Two or three weeks since he was walking on the new road between the Villa Nazionale and the sea, when he was seized by three men, who took his watch and all the money he had. Seeing that resistance was out of the question, he told them to take what they chose and thus escaped all violence. The probabilities are that one or more than one carried a revolver ; it is in very common use, as the daily reports assure us, and if not adopted as a substitute for the knife, it is as much used. The time was when these gentry were content with picking your pocket of your handkerchief, but they now <ly at higher game, and unless a man buttons up his coat or a woman puts her hand over her earn there is danger of losing a chain or earrings. Last week I read a report of the ears of a woman being lacerated by a thief, and it has been no uncommon thing. In short, the state of public security in. Naples is as bad as it can be, and unless strong measures are adopted the city which aspires to be the first in the kingdom must be set down at the bottom of the list. The truth is, I believe, that we are only reaping the fruits of that humanitarian spirit which half closes its eyes on small crimes and punishes others with the utmost leniency. ' Still Italy,' as was said recently after the trial of Passanante, 'is mistress in her own house and will not submit to dictation ;' but Italy at the same time must take the necessary conbequences of not being able to keep her own house in order. I s>ee that by a decree of the Minister of the Interior, 22 eamorrwti of the worst type are to be sent immediately to the island of Sicily, from which, after a villeggiatura of one year or more, they will return more accomplished villains than ever."