Evening star., 1941-08-11
Liquor Held Prolific
Cause of Crime
Restriction Of SuIes and More
Intelligent Handling Of
lnebriutes Proposed
By WILBUR LA ROE, T,
M.uher ~ District Parole Board.

Bu WILBUR La ROE, Jr.,
Member Of District Parole Board.
For many years have heard vague
and general statements about the rela-
ton between liquor and crime. More
recently, as a member of the Board OF
Parole, I have had an opportunity to
study many individual felony cases, and
the more I study them the more am
convinced that liquor is prolific cause
of crime.
In order to determine with some
definiteness the number of cases in
which liquor plays a part have Sc
lected at random 625 felony cases which
recently came before the Board of Pa
role. In 146 of these cases, or 23.4 per
cent, liquor was involved in the sense
that defendant was under the influence
of liquor when the crime was COM
mitted or had been convicted of intoxi-
cation. The crimes were not all recent,
but the cases were recently reviewed by
the Board of Parole.
A trAgic fact is that so many OF the
crimes caused by liquor are heinous
The mother of young baby stayed out
most of the night and got drunk. When
she returned in a stupefied condition
her grandmother upbraided her. Angry
and drunk, the young mother took her
baby into an adjoining lot, killed it by
hitting it over the head with a brick,
and threw it's body into sewer.
man with seven previous convictions
for drunkenness or disorderly conduct
and with one conviction for habitual
drunkenness killed an elderly man with
an ak and knocked another unconscious
threatening to kill everybody in the
house.
In the early hours of the morning q
filling station was broken into and over
$500 stolen from the safe. The con-
victed man had been drinking heavily
and had five convictions of drunkenness
and nine convictions of illegal posses
sion or sale of liquor in his past record.
Within the past few days vicious
attack was made on the l5-year-old
daughter of a Government official by a
man who carried bottle of liquor at
the time of the attack and who has
since stated that he was drunk.
In one of the local beer gardens
there was a fight. An officer tried to
eject drunken man. Another man with
seven cases of drunkenness or disorderly
conduct in his past record shot at the
policeman.
Early one morning a man was shot
and killed in a restaurant on Ninth
| street After drinking heavily OF both
beer and whiskey, defendant entered the
restaurant, shot two men and tried to
shoot third.
Defendant shot and killed a man fol-
lowing a drinking bout. He has nine
crimes in his past record, including in
toxication.
Defendant stabbed man several
times in the abdomen, killing him. De-
fendant had been drinking heavily and
had nine cases of drunk or disorderly,
one felony and IA other crimes in his
| past record.
Defendant was caretaker at boys
school. While drunk he took a 15-year-
old student into the woods and while
the boy begged on his knees for his life,
shot and killed him. He was sentenced
to be hanged but sentence was commuted
to life imprisonment on the theory that
he was too drunk to realize the nature
of his crime.
A serious robbery took place on one
of our streets. 1t developed later that
the man committing it had been drink
ing and that he had 13 crimes in his
past record.
The records of the Board of Parole
show numerous cases of forgery COM
mitted by drunken men. In a typical
case man with 10 convictions for
drunkenness and with several cases of
forgery in his past record forged the
checks of his own employer. Inebriates
will forge the checks of their own rela-
tives and friends. This is being done
in wholesale fashion. Probably IS per
cent of all forgery in the District Of
Columbia is committed for the purpose
of obtaining liquor, and usually by men
who are on spree at the time.
A man who had been on a drinking
spree shot and seriously wounded his
own daughter. Another killed his wife
while under the influence of liquor.
The foregoing are only few illustra-
tions cited from long list of crimes
which have taken from the records in
which there was a direct relation be-
tween liquor and the crime. From the
recent records which have examined
I have found the following felonies,
which were either committed by persons
under the influence of liquor or by In
ebriates or otherwise directly connected
with liquor: Is robberies, arsons, 20
housebreakings, Ia manslaughters, 20 as
Saults, murders and AZ other felonies-
total of LAG out of 625 cases studied.
My study convinces me, and I believe
1t will convince the public, that liquor
is making tremendous contribution to
serious crime in the Nations Capital,
being responsible for nearly one-fourth
of all the felonies. The study further
shows that many of our felonies are COM
mitted by men who have been convicted
many times of drunkenness. The only
conclusion that safely can be drawn