The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1931-08-21
crime COSTING
U. S. Billion,
HOOVER TOLD
RamiflcationS Too Vast to
Unearth, WickerSham
Body Finds.
URGES FURTHER PROBE
RaCketeering Is Branded as
Most Costly of All
in Nation.
BY PAUL II. MALLON
United Press STAFF Correspondent


WASHINGTON, Aug. 21.-Crime
costs the American people far more
than 81 POT 656,821 year, the Wick
ersham commission disclosed today
in its thirteenth report entitled
THE cost of crime"
How much more, the commission
declined to say. It found the
raniflcations of secret it'll in
dustries tho vast and its own funds
100 short 1t refused even to fix a
definite minimum figure but it cited
many items in the CRIME ledger,
which, added together brought the
total we'll over the billion mark.
Some items were roughly esti-
mated, some were frank guesSes,
while others-like the profits from
racketeering-were left with per
picking question mar n the tables
OF costs.
Justice inefficient"
A further investigation was rec
commended to determine the facts.
The commission did convince it
self definitely of many things, the
most important of which we're:
The federal government is spend
ing $52,786,000 a year to administer
justice to criminals.
Three hundred cities are spending
$247 100000.
Sixty-six per cent of the federal
expenditure goes for prohibition en-
forcement.
Some unnamed cities have waste
full and inefficient criminal justice
machinery.
Hit at Prohibition
An immediate investigation should
be made into racketeering-which
is called Americas most costly mod
ern crime.
An investigation should be made
to determine which cities are waste
full
With all its great expense, Grim
inal justice machinery does not cost
too much.
A wedding out of laws-eliminat-
ing unnecessary social restrictions
might we'll be undertaken as a
measure of economy.
Although the word prohibition is
not directly mentioned in that con-
nection, the commission incorpo-
rated in its report the report of its
leading investigator. Sidney P.
Simpson of the New York bar, who
said:
Urges Law ReVisions"
"A part OF the money now re-
CURED to be expended in the adj
ministration of criminal justice is
spent in the enforcement of statutes
applying to conduc with which it
is matter of debate whether the
people and the criminal courts are
intrinsically fitted to deal, and
which must, in some cases, at least,
be regarded as outside the limits of
effective legal action by means of
the criminal law
"A thorough overhauling OF our
criminal codes with a view to ap-
praising the social advantage of
such statutes and comparing that
advantage, if any, with the cost of
their administration would appear
highly desirable from an economic
standpoint"
Cites Tax Burden
1T is clear, we think, that the
cost of enforcing the criminal law
would be less if it did not attempt
TO forbid and punish acts partici-
pated In by large numbers of other
wise law abiding citizens who do
not regard such prohibited acts as
criminal except in a technical
sense.
However, the desirability of thus
reducing the burden imposed on the
taxpaying public by expenditures
for criminal justice will undoubt-
edly be determined in the light of
views as to social considerations
with which we are not concerned
in this report"