The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-12-10
OUR CHILD CRIMINALS

Every reliable report on the present trends in
American crimnality brings out clearly the alarming
increase in youthful crime This growth of juvenile
crime, along with the rackets and gangdom consti-
tutes the core of the crime problem today Old-line
crimes by adult criminals are almost negligible bv
comparison.
For this reason, any special study of Juvenile
crmnalty in an important urban area is of the ut
most Importance for those interested in the problem of
crime and its repression. Great educational and
practical Importance attaches therefore to the re-
Gently published report of the New York crime COM
mission on crime and punishment among the 1920
year-old group in New York City, prepared with
great care by Harry M Shuman and Rose Rosen-
berg.
The following the major facts disclosed.
The number of arrests of boys in the 1920 age
group was proportonately greater than the arrests
among all the male population-4,780 out of 100000
population against $3.50 out of 100000 This group
OF boys was arraigned for more than half (545 per
cent? the auto thefts, 80 per cent of sex crimes
against girls, 80 per cent of burgares, and Is per
cent of all robberies
The administration of criminal Justice among the
juvenile group under consideration was not notably
different from that among the adult criminals in
the New York area. About the same proportion re-
ceived or escaped punishment.
The boys did, however, profit by somewhat
greater application of the indeterminate sentence
to their cases and by more frequent commitment
to reformatores instead of state prisons Yet plenty
OF boys were sentenced to state prisons some of them
for long terms. The juvenile court laws and pro-
cedure could not be applied to this group because
of legal restrictions.
These adolescent criminals were subjected tn de-
grading association with hardened adult criminals
and degenerates while awaiting trial ONLY 10 per
cent could obtain bail after being reanded for trial
and only Is per cent obtained freedom on bail at
any time Only few made use of assigned counsel
Scientific justice was frustrated in large part bv
degrading bargaining in the courts In 1914 out of
1884 felony cases. pleas were taken on reduced
charges This meant that the guilty often escaped
severe punishment and the innocent were tempted
to plead guilty rather than take chance on the
outcome of trial.
The degradation of Jail association was height
ened by the sowness of judicial procedure in spite
of the fact that the felony courts were not over
crowded and that most of those arrested were dis
posed of without formal trial.
Forty per cent of the cases Jagged more than
thirty days and more than half of these were held
from two to six months before they finally were
disposed Of.
All these conditons-third degree practices by
the police, overcrowding moral degradation, willy
tactics of counsel in advising plea of mot guilty
later changed to guilty" of lesser crime in bar
gaining with the courts-had disastrous moral and
psychological results these youthful deIinquents
Finally, in marked contrast to the procedure in
good juvenile courts the judges considered the Of
tense rather than the offender and sentenced inds-
criminately ignoring the wide differences in the
social background of the offenders and in the pros
pect of their reformation