Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1913-06-20
HINTS ON PRISON
REFORM FROM CELL
SeattIe's Whilom Police Chief,
Convict $3.50, Sees Offend
ers in New Light.

WALLA WALLA PENITEN-
TIARY, Wash, June 20.-Charles w.
Wappenstein. formerly chief of police
of Seattle. sent thousands of men to
the penitentiary. Now he is himself
a convict He was committed himself
year ago to serve from three to ten
years for bribe-t taking.
1T is not" he says, with a wry
smile, IAN experience which man
would seek voluntarily. 1t is, how
ever, an experience without which no
one, police officer or social reformer.
can understand even vaguely the
problem of what to do with crimi-
mars.
First, I was a policeman on the
beat; then detective; finally chief.
| thought ! was wise 1 was as
wise as it is possible for man to be
who has never done time in prison
and seen at first hand to what extent
our reformatories do not reform.
Wappenstein is not the 'Wappy"
Seattle used to know in the tough
days of the vice syndicate"
Before he went out of the world of
men and became No. 6539, he was
familiar type of the police officer
brusoue and domineering in manner;
heavy-handed, heavy-footed, bull
necked; sophisticated and a bit hard,
taking cynical view of life.
He had the policeman's attitude.
Every suspect ought to be arrested.
Every prisoner was guilty.
fH2Q ic fodoU
gentle, rustic figure whose eyes smile
almost timidly through steel-rimmed
glasses. Weeks ago he asked to be
transferred to the chicken house. as,
on his release, he expects to go into
the embarrassing business and
wants the experience
There you may find him any day
surrounded by the clucking hens
strutting ROSTERS. and swarms of
cheeping chicks. On his gray, shoddy
high hitched trousers, his hickory
shirt, his ill-ftting shoddy coat. are
stenciled in big black numerals
$780,
Il was glad to get outside the
WALL" said Wappenstein. Its hell
in the jute-mill. There's no ventila-
ton and you have to breathe the fine
particles from the jute. A few months
of it is pretty nearly sure death to
man with weak lungs or who is
predisposed to tuberculosis.
Il wouldn't have kicked, you I'M
derstand,' he went on, eff they had
kept me there. You have to take
your medicine when you come here.
l sent others here-lots of them-and
| didn't feel much sympathy for
them either.
But l think now that I would be
able to distinguish better between
mere offenders against the law and
actual criminals. There are good
men in this pen who ought not to be
here. The trouble is that the law
does not always distinguish between
acts and motives. If man commits
a certain crime the law says he must
be given a certain punishment
But why did he commit the crime?
The law seldom asks.
yet what he did is not as impor-
tant as why he did it,
IF you steal because you are hun
cry should you be punished as Sc
verely as if you stole because you
were greedy?
And penitentiaries don't reform.
These men, some of whom I put here,
are more deeply stepped in crime and
vice now than when they committed
the crimes of which they were con-
victed.
They are leading abnormal lives.
They are locked up in tiny cells at
night. They are not allowed to talk
at work or at meals. All about them
are guards armed with rifles. Every
thing about them is designed to re-
mind them that they have fallen.
They work, but their toll does not
profit them or the State They know
they are a burden to the State-a
dead loss. How are hope. ambition
and pride to survive in the breast of
a man who knows that he is no good
to society, himself or anybody They
ought to have useful work, more lib
erty and more fresh air.
There are hard men in this pen,
plenty of them. There are good men,
but they will not stay good long.
Graduated from the 'college'-that is
what crooks call penitentiaries-they
will return to society with stunted
bodies and dwarfed souls. They will
educate others in the art of crime.