The Savannah morning news., 1904-05-15
LONDON SCHOOL FOR THIEVES
How the Modern FaSin Teaches His
Boys and Girls to Steal.

/
Boys and Girls to Steal.
From the London Daily Mail.
Daring crimes are often committed by
children in London. and only Scotland
| Yard is aware OF the fact.
Youthful offenders are rarely caught
| in the act of committing even slight
| offences, or, if they are, a tolerant pO-
liceman is more often than not in
clined to look with lenient eyes on
a misdemeanor that in an older person
would mean immediate arrest, by box
| ing the ears of the tiny culprit and
! letting him ego.
! The recent remarkable series of
housebreaking cases in the Enfield dis
trict, in which the father of an err
rand boy was sentenced to six years
penal servitude for teaching his IL
year old son to commit burglaries shows
conclusively that the criminal classes
do not hesitate to teach children to
do what they fedr to practise them
| selves.
The Scotland Yard authorities know
that many criminals, too old now to
! commit various crimes with impun-
| ity, to all intents and purposes re-
form, and become respectable mem
| bers of the community. They open
small shops, and then in a very quiet
way hold classes of pupils eager to
pay for learning the secrets of the
| craft"
The first thing the master" does
is to examine the would-be probation
er's hands. The "thiefs mark" must
! show up strongly upon both, or the
| boy or girl is not worth the risk of
| training. Even if the child has clever,
| light fingered parents, and the "thief's
mark" is absent from its hands, the
tlainer will have nothing to do with
| the He does no in
child inheriting its parents evil pro-
pensties.
Girls are mostly taught pocket pick
ing and how to steal trihes from show
showcases. Members of both sexes
are well drilled in the art of unblush-
lngly telling lies. They daily rehearse
"hold-ups' by imaginary policemen.
The trainer of course, acts the latter
role, and instructs the young idea how
| to invent plausible excuses at a sec
ond's notice
The girls are the sharpest at this
! game, and very seldom get caught A
trainer will never have anything more
| TO do with a child that has once en-
| tered reformatory. The clergyman
there has generally worked on the
youthful conscience, and ever after
| fits of repentance must be counted on
| TO occur at inopportune moments.
Boy burglars are trained in a very
simple manner 1t is argued that most
people living in villas pay a great deal
of attention to the bolts and bars on
their ground floors. but very little if
any to those on the first.
Accordingly the Juvenile Bill Skies is
provided in the early days of his train
ing with ten-foot silken rope tied in
knots foot apart. Fastened at the
end is strong but light steel hook.
The boy is required to practice with
this rope, throwing it in much the
same way as a lasso would be up to a
window sill six or more feet above him,
so that the hook holds to the stone.
When the lassoing is acquired to the
trainers satisfaction, the lad is next
| required to shin UP the rope without
dislodging the hook from the sill. This
requires a great deal of practice, and
many are the falls endured. AS the
hight is seldom more than ten feet. and
prior to this stage the boy is taught
how to fall, only slight bruises result
The children in their first expeditions
are always taken and shown the house
that Is to be entered in the daytime,
and instructed as to the best methods
of entry to the back.
Then late at night the instructor
takes the little lad to the Crib" and
from convenient spot watches his pu-
pill disappear according to Instructions.
The presence of an adult with a boy
of tender years late at night disarms
any suspicion an alert policeman
might have If the boy were seen walk
ing through a street alone.
Once at the back of the house the
boy, quite at his leisure, makes an in
spection of every window on the
ground floor. If one opens readily
he enters by 1t, if not he surveys the
the next tier, and in nine cases out of
ten discovers that the bathroom win
dow is partly open. That is sufficient.
From a side pocket he draws the coil
of silken rope, and couple of min
utes later is standing inside the little
room.
The juvenile burglar is instructed to
make his entry by bathroom wher-
ever possible because there is always
| a risk in villadom of any or every
room being occupied as a bedroom, and
window opening with a sleeper in
the room would nearly always insure
an alarm being raised.
Not long ago a remarkable thing
| happened at a villa on Brixton Hill.
| When the people awakened in the
| morning. the house was in perfect Or
der; every window was closed and
fastened, every door was bolted. Yet
| every. ones pockets had been rified,
every article Of jewelry had been taken
away during the night. The maid and
her boxes were searched, but even she
was minus her months money, paid
the day before.
The police were communicated with.
| On examination tiny finger marks were
found on the bathroom window, and
traces of a hook were plainly visible
on the window sill. A clever boy bur-
| glar had paid the villa visit. He
| was never caught for he had depart
| ed in the way he had come, taking
with him only valuables that could be
carried unobserved in his pockets.