‘CHRISTIAN CRIMINOLOGY’

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 983, 28 May 1930, Page 18

‘CHRISTIAN CRIMINOLOGY’

REV. JASPER CALDER’S WORK APPRECIATION OF POLICE “Except for the Sunday evening mission services, my principal duties might be described as those of a Christian criminologist.” This statement was made by the Rev. Jasper Calder, at the annual meeting of the Auckland City Mission last evening, during the course of an address on his work, and in making appreciative reference to the assistance afforded him by the police. Mr. Calder said he used the term of Christian criminologist advisedly, as the days of the purely academic crime specialist had gone by the board. “The following-on principle is what absorbs me,” he said. “To discover why some unfortunate wretch falls continually into the one particular kind of crime, to put it in a book and let it go at that, savours of Lombroso and the Italian school. The modern method is that the student of criminology is the one man particularly who should also be the helper of the criminal. “I will content myself with saying that the magistrates and also their Honours of the Supreme Court have been exceedingly patient with my rather unorthodox methods, and have extended me every courtesy. The same may be said of the police who, in my opinion, are the finest body of men in New Zealand. Their officials are always ready to co-operate in giving the first offender a chance, and after investigating numbers of cases I have never been able to discover where any decent young fellow who has stumbled has been ‘hounded down.’ “Many’s the time a police official and even the humble constable have assisted a first offender with a small financial aid at a time of great distress. Mr. W. J. Campbell, the probation officer, is the right man in the right place, and an excellent fellow to work with. I desire to acknowledge many courtesies from the Minister of Justice, the Controller-General of Prisons ar.d the various officials with whom I come in contact.”