The Mathews journal. (Mathews C.H. [Court House]) 1903-1937, 1906-07-19
70 AID BOYS MADE
ID GOOD BY SURGICAL
OPERATIONS


at the bar, be taken forthwith to ST
Luke's Hospital by his mother and
an officer OF this court. and that the
surgeons properly in attendance at
that institution perform such opera
ton on the said Jacob Haddiman as
viii be necessary. In their judgment,
TO remove any and all such pressure
on his brain as may be caused by
adeHoids or other accretions, and
that the said Jacob Haddiman be de-
tanned in st. Luke's Hospital subject
to the order of court"
Judge Julian Mack, OF Chicago,
and Judge Harald Solomon, of Stock
holm, Sweden. were sitting on the
bench with Judge Barratt in the Jul
venile Court here when this unprece-
denied order was handed down, and
both concurred in the thought that
too many boys are sent to prison who
should be cared for in clinics.
In Pennsylvania a judge may send
boys to any one of the several re-
fOrmatories or to an asylum. Since
he mas made a special study of juve-
nile crime Judge Barratt has COM
mitted several boys to the State Hos
pital for the Insane in Norristown.
where. under competent medical and
surgical treatment, wonders have
been worked with incOrrigibles.
DR.. Ernest La Place trephined the
skull of Sturgeon Welty, and a very
wicked boy became a lOvable and
| capable little chap. DR.. Desiderio
| Roman, who accompanied Lieutenant
Peary in his hunt for the North Pole,
did the same for Jacob Haddiman in
st. Luke's Hospital. and the boy,
who was a daring and persistent
thief, shows marked and increasing
| signs of moral regeneration. Jacob
Haddiman, it was discovered, had
a fractured skull.
Who, then, shall now insist that all
criminals are merely vicious and that
none is diseased or malformed? The
| proposition advanced by Edward
Dunlap, burglar, really seems to be
close to proof.
The Theory of the Burglar.
Hear Dunlap, who, when willing
his brain to science. wrote, with the
hand of death on him:
q am and have been all my life
a criminal. Why?
WAS 1 born too late? Should l
have lived in the days of the great
! dyenturers-Drake and Cortes and
all other pillagers and. conquerors
and heroic thieves who could trace
their lineage back further than Jason
who quested for the Golden Fleece?
WAS l born too early-before the
days of high finance and the unhero-
| t. Il;
cor was it because of some subtle
quirk III my brain, some cerebral
formation. some little. grouping of
the brain cells, that /, who should
have been an honest man. an artist,
a poet perhaps. became a burglar
May it not be that a spicule of bone
presses on n convolution Of my brain
and, so doing. prevents my whole
nature?
I Il do not know. and l have thought
hard and long on the causes. But
this, although do not know, is what
1 am inclined 20 think: Real crime
is a disease, or rather crime is the
symptom of q subtle disease of brain
and nerve, just as a rash is in some
cases a symptom of fever. All those
who are criminals-and in this list
| place the ancient conquerors. the
gentlemen adventures, the burglar
the counterfeiter, the swindler, the
priest of high finance. all of the
under world, and ell, too, of the
upper world who are tinged with the
eVil-all those who are criminals,
say. have this disease.
cit may be that the disease that
terminates crimes and criminals
springs from n bacillus. There arc
many reasons for believing it is So
! have seen the criminal faint com
municated in the most curious ways
hardly credible. 1 have seen Grim
inal phenomena that parallelled the
contagion of slow fevers. the stride
of quick. destructive disease.
Certainly crime is contagious.
have seen honest, law-abiding meT
turned within a fortnight to Grim
inals. have seen others in whom
the course of the incubation wa:
slower.
"Is there a subtle bacillus of evil
a germ of crime, that causes the fer
ment of the under world? 1 do no
know Perhaps my brain will tell
l have left it for the men Of science
to ponder over, to dissect, to exam
inc microscopically. Perhaps the.
caI find the germ of crime. So
who all my life was the enemy of so
ciety. may by my death become it
benefactor.
Instead of prisons I would hav,
sanatoria for the treatment Of Grim
inals. / would have the finest spe
cialists for them. 1 would have tn
disease of crime COPIED with logically
OF course ~. q lminal should be sc
gregated, but the disease should b.
recognized The treatment of tn
criminal of to-day is parallelled b,
the treatment of the insane durini
the Mi. lie Ages, and, in fact, as shor
fIpon oOn tho aiObSpoDfh CON