Crime And Punishment

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 28, 28 October 1942, Page 6

Crime And Punishment

Sir, —Twice within three months in this country crimes of the most abhorrent nature have been committed—the first, outrage and murder of two elderly women, the second, incest upon a schoolgirl of 14. In both cases the only punishment that can be meted out to the criminals under the existing law is a term of- imprisonment. What is the attitude of our women members of Parliament in this matter? Are they going to sit down quietly while these horrors are being perpetrated in their midst —never knowing whose turn it may be next—or are they going to awake from their apathy land demand from the Government some change in its anaemic legislation? After the Wairoa murders there were one or two who raised a protest against the present inadequate methods of punishment, but they were as voices crying in the wilderness, and their appeal has been lost sight of in the surge of daily events. Now this second bestial atrocity has occurred. Statistics purporting to show that capital punishment and flogging do not reduce the number of murders and sexual crimes or, conversely, that the absence of these drastic punishments does not increase the number, prove nothing. No one can estimate the deterring effect of either capital punishment or flogging on the minds of those who commit the type of crime for which these measures are the only adequate penalty. The point is that such measures should be available. Human beings are in varying stages ot development. There are those to whom humane measures may be applied with benefit. There are others—inhuman or sub-human —who can be reached only by bodily chastisement or the fear of it. Magistrates and judges, whose knowledge of crime and criminals is surely wider and more profound than that or the passing politician of a day, have condemned the abolition, both of capital punishment and of flogging in no uncertain terms. Yet nothing is done The challenge is here for the women of New Zealand, through their organizations, to take up.—l am. etc., ACTION. ■Wellington, October 19.