The Roots of Crime Michael Astor, H. S. Morris The
Other Exodus Walid Khatidi, David Cairns, Erskine B. Childers
Not Good Enough H. P. J. Nanning Can We Afford Macmillan? Demand Donnelly, MP
IIE ROOTS OF CRIME
Sin,—Your article The Roots of Crime' raises the matter of long-term prison sentences and questions whether they act as a deterrent to crime. It quotes the case of Arthur Jones, who has been sentenced to life imprisonment to run consecutively with an earlier sentence of fourteen yeas passed on him in the same court. Arthur Jones's criminal record makes it reasonably plain that he is a man who, given the opportunity, cannot prevent himself at certain seasons in his life committing rape and, in a certain mood, rape with murder. His age, and the pattern of his record, indicate that it is extremely unlikely that he could ever become a 'safe' member of society. If his long prison sentence will not deter other poten- tial rapists—and I share your view that it will not, in this sense, act as a deterrent—it will at least deter Arthur Jones from raping any more children, at least in this life.
Although the punitive aspects of imprisonment are largely negative, in the sense that they do little if anything to improve the ethics of a society, life imprisonment, in certain cases, at least fulfils one function of the law. It affords society protection against some of its more dangerous members. This is a function which the law must never. abrogate.—
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