[7]
[7] Fliche, ``Comment en devient Criminel,'' Paris, 1886.
Of those criminals who begin by being occasional criminals, and
end, after progressive degeneration, by exhibiting the features of
the born criminals, Thomas More said, ``What is this but to make
thieves for the pleasure of hanging them?'' And it is just
this class of criminals whom measures of social prevention might
reduce to a minimum, for by abolishing the causes we abolish the
effects.
Apart from their organic and psychological characteristics, innate
or acquired, there are two bio-sociological symptoms which seem to
me to be common, though for distinct reasons, to born criminals
and habitual criminals. I mean precocity and relapse. The
occasional crime and the crime of passion do not, as a rule, occur
before manhood, and rarely or never lead to relapse.
Here are a few figures concerning precocity, derived from
international prison statistics:--
PRISONERS UNDER 20 YEARS OF AGE. Male. Female.
__________________________________________________________________
p.c. p.c.
Italy (1871--6) ... ... ... ... ... ... .
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