STUDYING CRIMINALS

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 133, 2 December 1929, Page 19

STUDYING CRIMINALS

A mooting of tho New Zealand Howard League for Penal Reform, hold laat week, was addressed by Dr. I. L. G. Sutherland, of Victoria University, on crinio rind phyehological research of causes of crime. Mr. J. J. Garbctt presided. Describing the great Congress of Psychology held at Yale, -the speaker passed on-to Chicago's crime record, largely duo to its-rapid growth in tho absence of traditions. In 1928 there were > 399 murdors in that city, which seriously rivals Now York in magnitude, and 110 bombings. He told of tho extensive system of criminal exploitation backed up by- armed forco, the "racketeer living on the industry of others, by intimidation and political graft.

Analysing mutinies in prisons in America, tho speaker attributed them to bad living quarters and' overcrowding; the cell blocks at Auburn and Clindon, built in ISIO and 1845 vespoetively, boing still in use.

Dr. Sutherland also spoko of the root causes of criminality, and of the two groups of thought—one emphasising the influence of both heredity and environment, and regarding the criminal as having a sick mind which must be brought back to health, and the other holding the conservative view, that the criminal is morally responsible and must be punished until he has suffered moral reformation. A bright side was given the subject by a review of modern methods of advice and assistance.