Evening star., 1899-04-07
JUVENILE CRIMINALS.
Hardened Experts In Crime Who Are
of Tender Years.
From Tit Bits.

of Tender Years.
From Tit-Bits.
Crime, like a gigantic octopus, seizes all
classes and ages of human beings in its
fatal claws and even the juvenile portion
of the population help in no small degree
to swell the black records of the history of
misdeeds.
Perhaps the most terrible case of GRIMM
ality in of tender years happened in
Vienna some years ago. where a boy of ten
killed his little brother and sister and after
ward put end to his own existence.
Jealousy was the cause of this shocking
tragedy.
There have been many crimes of this ma
ture committed by children in Great Brit
ain the most conspicuous, perhaps being
that which occurred in the Midiands not
so very long ago. when little girl hardly
twelve years of age poisoned her nurse.
who had treated her somewhat harshly for
trivial offense. Some rat poison having
been procured by the cook for the purpose
of destroying some aggressive rodents that
haunted the kitchen, the child secretly put
a portion of the powder in her nurses tea
The result naturally was that the unfortu-
nate woman had no sooner swallowed half
q cup of the fluid than she fell back in
horrible agonies. expiring soon afterward:
whereupon the Juvenile monster calmly con-
fessed what she had done.
Brain specialists tell us that such GRIM
inality developing at tender an age is
nearly always inherited. but in the cases
quoted above the writer believes that the
DrOgenitOrS of the youthful male1aclOrS
were people of excellent lives, so that the
outbreak of wickedness in question must
have been due to some other cause which
science so far has not explained.
The wrecking of trains by means of bars
placed on the track is quite a common Of
fense among youthful criminals. and, Curl
Ously enough. it is not only in this country,
but in foreign lands well that the prac-
tice prevails In Germany boys are con-
stantly being arrested for endeavoring to
wreck passenger expresses. and 1t may be
said in parentheSes that the penalty meted
out TO the culprits in that country is Tar
more severe tn an in our own, and, the writ
er thinks deServedly so.
Only the other day couple of boy bur
glars were brought up at a London ponce
court charged with breaking into a house
for felOnOus purposes. One of the prison.
ers, a boy of seven, was so tiny that ms
head could not be seen above the dock rail-
ing and he had to be lifted by a stalwart
warder in order that the magistrate might
see him. The two were sent to a reforIna-
tory. where, il is to be hoped, they will re-
form.
OF the many crimes committed by children
the rarest is certainly forgery. though this
also has on several occasions been done by
comparatively tiny ScribeS. In Chicago
toward the end of 1888 a sensational forgery
of check for some 81. 600 was traced to lad
of fourteen, he having devoted his spare
time to the copying of his employers sig
nature with the criminal result in question.
1t is recorded that the youths talent for
such imitation was quite marvellous, as no
fewer than four Ddnk CLERKS SWOfe tHdI
they had believed the signature on the
check to be thoroughly genuine. and the
employer himself confessed that in an un-
guarded moment he would have taken the
writing for his own Verify. precoclty Tor
crime hich, happily, is rarely manifest
In agricultural districts the number of
fires brought about by boys whose age ap-
proaches the infantile is quite extraordl-
nary the victims in most cases being farm
ers whose resentment of orchard pllferlrg
has angered the revengeful youngsters Al
MaIdon. in Essex. ricks 10 the value OF
many hundreds of pounds were set hre 70
and totally demolished by a child of some
nine or ten years whom the farmer had pun
ished rather vigorously on the preceding
day for Il depreciation of some kind me
small incendIary ran away after accomplish
ing his vengeance and was never heard Of
afterward. Dwellers in the country will call
to mind many similar crimes by children,
though few of them fortunately are of such
magnitude.
A. the central criminal court some years
ago youthful .pickpocket was brought up
for trial. No fewer than four previous con
victions had been entered against this bright
youngster, and ii transpired that some OF
the thefts had been ingenious and skillful
in the extreme. The age Of this hardened Of
fender was thirteen years and four months!
The record of youthful crime however. Is
probably held by Roumanian youth. VINO
in the course of fourteen years committed
several burglaries and numberless assaults,
and altogether distinguished himself in a
manner which it is to be hoped few would
emulate Before he was ten this precocious
child was an adept at robbery of every
kind. his first theft being from his uncle
cash box. To top his crime he finished by
brutaHy killing old man who threatened
TO hand him over to the police for some Of
fense and as a result he was sent to pris-
on for an exceedingly long term juvenile
criminals do not receive the same tender
consideration abroad that they have in this
country and the youth in question only
narrowly escaped paying the penalty of his
crime with his life.