New-York tribune., 1920-12-10
MIR. Enright's Confession


: survey of his department is Far
more significant than his small con-
tradictions of immaterial detail. It
Is incomparably more cvidential than
his statistics-the privately calcu-
lated summary of a secret record
kept according to his own peculiar
directions.
The Tribune endeavored to do
more than rehearse the crime con-
ditions of the city, which are, in their
general proportion and peril, a mat
ter of common knowledge. 1t pr
marily sought to analyze the causes
of the police break down and discover
how and why the existing reign Of
criminals was set up. 1t expressly
cleared the rank and file of the force
of inefficiency-though Mr.. Enrigtt
ignores this fact and seeks to inter
pret the investigation as a slur upon
the whole force.
Two major conclusions were indi-
Gated. The first was that the de-
tective bureau, brought to a high
state of intelligence and skill under
Arthur Woods, had been disinte-
grated and demoralized. The sec
ond was that the city was hope
lessly underpoliced, a situation due
in part to the endless number of
special details created by Mr.. En-
right.
Mr.. Enright has not seen fit to
discuss either of these points in his
reply to The Tribune. Why were
the efficient special squads of de-
tectives abolished or weakened?
Why were experts taken off, trans
ferred to jobs of which they knew
nothing and replaced by unframed
men? Why were the outstanding
detective brains of the bureau subor-
dinated to the control of the ubiqui-
tous Lahey?
As for the underpolicing: When
Mr.. Enright requested an increased
force Mr.. Curran asked the Mayor
to secure list of the special de-
tails. This list has not yet been
furnished. Mr.. Enright might have
included it in his reply of yesterday
He did not. He was profoundly
silent with respect to these two chief
indictments against his regime.
Instead, the Commissioner devoted
his space to his own police made
statistics and to proving that The
Tribune record, avowedly and neces-
sarily made from newspaper files,
was erroneous in a few cases. He
cid not attempt to deny the principal
charge that there have been 100
unsolved murders in the city since
January |. He spent most of his
time in proving that the police had
made arrests" in cases wherein
the Tribune investigation of news
paper records showed no arrests re-
ported. Making arrests has about
as much to do with the grave charge
against Mr.. Enright as issuing de-
malls has. The arrests in these
cases evidently amounted to nothing
and led to nothing, least Of all to
any of the one hundred untouched
murderers at large to-day.
There remains Mr.. Enright's table
Of figures proving that New York
was never so peaceful and safe as to-
day. By his statistics, despite the
increase in population, crime has nu-
merically declined. The Tribune has
already pointed out in detail just
Why Mr.. Enright's figures are not
worth the paper they are written on.
He himself, for reasons known only
to himself, abolished the "squeal
book" wherein complaints of citi-
zens were recorded. A burglary"
is not a burglary under Mr.. En-
rights ingenious system unless there
is physical evidence thereof-a
broken lock, for instance. How many
burglaries have actually been COM
noitted in New York under the En-
right rule will therefore probably
never be known. But the burglary
insurance companies have a pretty
good notion. The head Of one Of
the oldest companies stated in The
Tribune that their Investigations
showed that eight persons out Of ten
who had been robbed or held up had
not bothered to report their cases to
the police Why should they, when
the detective bureau had become n
byword and report TO the police
led only TO stupid and pcrfunctory
call? To certain extent, there
fore, Mr.. Enright's figures represent
the consequences Of his own no
torious inefIiciency.
The Tribune Will be glad to print
any further replies which Mr.. En-
sxht psAx Wish u make. But his