An Increase in Crime • The disclosure in the criminal
statistics for 1930, issued on Wednesday, that the total of crimes known to the police in that year was the highest of this century is obviously disturbing. The figure, 117,031, for• a impala- tion of 38,000,000 (England and Wales) is in 111) sense alarming, but it is fro• from satisfactory to find an increase of 12,150 in 1930 over the 1929 total. Two questions immediately arise, the cause for the increase and the efficacy of the deterrent methods in vogue. As to the former it is suggested that the lawless activity of at genera- tion left largely undisciplined during the WI u• years of its adolescence accounts for a good deal (40 per rent. of the criminals were under twenty-one), and 1111 analysis of the figures shows that the main increase (over 10,700 out of a total increase of 12,450) is in such c•rines as larceny and breaking-in. The prevalenee of unemployment and economic stress suggests an obvious explanation for thud. An increase of 136 in crimes of violence against the person is more disturbing. On the question of methods of punishment it would be unwise to draw any dogmatic conclusion. The severity school and the leniency school could each derive from the statistics 11 e01011111 hie ease for its own thesis.
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