Evening star., 1934-07-06
PARLE.Y ON CRIME
IS PLANNED HERE
Attorney General Cummings
Announces Session for
Some Time in Fall.

With the approval of President
Roosevelt. the Department OF Justice
is making plans for a national crime
conference here late this year, it was
announced today by Attorney Gen.
eral Cummings at a luncheon of the
National Press Club.
The conference, to be held in No
vember or December, will consider
practically every aspect of crime and
approach the problem of law enforce
ment in a way never before at
tempted" Cummings told newspaper
men who were his hosts.
Representatives of each of the
States will be invited to participate
in the meeting, the agenda for which
will be worked out during the Sum-
mer, he said.
The conference will be held in the
auditorium Of the new Department of
Commerce Building at Tenth and
Pennsylvania avenue, where seating
facilities for several hundred persons
will be available The meeting will be
the first he'd in the new hall
Will Seek Cooperation.
While the Attorney General did not
elaborate further on the objectives of
the conference. it is understood the
chief purpose will be to improve CO.
operation among law enforcement
authorities and to lay a groundwork
for effective coordination of Federal,
State and municipal inveStigative
functions
When we started upon our cam
paign against crime Cummings
stated, there we're two things by
which we were guided. One was that
the situation required the vigorous,
positive leadership of the one agency
in the country that could treat the
challenge o. crime from a wide ma
tional viewpoint. The other was that
unrelenting ard persistent efforts
should be made to lay a stronger
foundation for a more intelligent ad-
ministration of justice.
Report Of Progress justified.
"I believe we are justified in report
ing great progress. The common
gangster, the corrupt corporation. the
crooked official and the conniving
lawyer certainly can find comfort
neither in the record nor the outlook. -
Cummings disclosed that in a few
Gays" he will inspect the Government S
new penitentiary for incorrigible
criminalS-AlcatraZ prison. in San
Francisco Bay. He said the conversion
of this old military prison into place
of confinement for hardened convicts
seems to me a symbol of the i'm
placable purpose of the Federal Gov
eminent to perform its part in making
this country a safer place in which to
live
Cites Inscriptions Lawyers.
Telling of some Of the serious Situ-
ations" encountered by the Justice
Department in its war on crime. Cum
nnings deprecated the connivance of
the unscrupulous lawyer" ready, he
said ito discard every vestige of
ethics in order to cover up his clients
acts, to get him OFF in the courts or
actually to plot the carrying out of
criminal purposes"
He said another scourge" was the
jnterlinking in some communities OF
politics and corruption, Of gangsters
and oficials, with instances in which
police oficials were brought under
grave suspicion" and in which public
officers gave aid and comfort to fugi-
tive despers does.
But for the silly, coddhng antics
of some minor officers who, if nothing
worse lost their heads in the glare
of the limelight." he declared some
of the most notorious gangsters would
never have been at large after their
first capture"
Cummings thanked the press for its
cooperation in guiding public opinion
in support of the battle against law
lessness.