of the total number of condemned
persons, and by somewhat less in France and Belgium.
persons, and by somewhat less in France and Belgium.
Criminal Sociology by Enrico Ferri
The technical inquiry into these bio-
psychical characteristics is the special work of this new science
of criminal anthropology.
Now these data, which are the conclusions of the anthropologist,
are but starting-points for the criminal sociologist, from which
he has to reach his legal and social conclusions. Criminal
anthropology is to criminal sociology, in its scientific
function, what the biological sciences, in description and
experimentation, are to clinical practice.
In other words, the criminal sociologist is not in duty bound to
conduct for himself the inquiries of criminal anthropology, just
as the clinical operator is not bound to be a physiologist or an
anatomist. No doubt the direct observation of criminals is a very
serviceable study, even for the criminal sociologist; but the only
duty of the latter is to base his legal and social inferences upon
the positive data of criminal anthropology for the biological
aspects of crime, and upon statistical data for the influences of
physical and social environment, instead of contenting himself
with mere abstract legal syllogisms.
On the other hand it is clear that sundry questions which have a
direct bearing upon criminal anthropology--as, for instance, in
regard to some particular biological characteristic, or to its
evolutionary significance--have no immediate obligation or value
for criminal sociology, which employs only the fundamental and
most indubitable data of criminal anthropology. So that it is but
a clumsy way of propounding the question to ask, as it is too
frequently asked: ``What connection can there be between the
cephalic index, or the transverse measurement of a murderer's jaw,
and his responsibility for the crime which he has committed? ''
The scientific function of the anthropological data is a very
different thing, and the only legitimate question which sociology
can put to anthropology is this:--``Is the criminal, and in what
respects is he, a normal or an abnormal man? And if he is,
or when he is abnormal, whence is the abnormality derived? Is it
congenital or contracted, capable or incapable of rectification? ''
This is all; and yet it is sufficient to enable the student of
crime to arrive at positive conclusions concerning the measures
which society can take in order to defend itself against crime;
whilst he can draw other conclusions from criminal statistics.
As for the principal data hitherto established by criminal
anthropology, whilst we must refer the reader for detailed
information to the works of specialists, we may repeat that this
new science studies the criminal in his organic and in his
psychical constitution, for these are the two inseparable aspects
of human existence.
A beginning has naturally been made with the organic study of the
criminal, both anatomical and physiological, since we must study
the organ before the function, and the physical before the moral.
This, however, has given rise to a host of misconceptions and one-
sided criticisms, which have not yet ceased; for criminal
anthropology has been charged, by such as consider only the most
conspicuous data with narrowing crime down to the mere result of
conformations of the skull or convolutions of the brain. The fact
is that purely morphological observations are but preliminary
steps to the histological and physiological study of the brain,
and of the body as a whole.
As for craniology, especially in regard to the two distinct and
characteristic types of criminals--murderers and thieves, an
incontestable inferiority has been noted in the shape of the head,
by comparison with normal men, together with a greater frequency
of hereditary and pathological departures from the normal type.
Similarly an examination of the brains of criminals, whilst it
reveals in them an inferiority of form and histological type,
gives also, in a great majority of cases, indications of disease
which were frequently undetected in their lifetime. Thus M.
Dally, who for twenty years past has displayed exceptional acumen
in problems of this kind, said that ``all the criminals who had
been subjected to autopsy (after execution) gave evidence of
cerebral injury. ''[3]
[3] In a discussion at the Medico-Psychological Society of Paris;
``Proceedings'' for 1881, i. 93, 266, 280, 483.
Observations of the physiognomy of criminals, which no one will
undervalue who has studied criminals in their lifetime, with
adequate knowledge, as well as other physical inquiries, external
and internal, have shown the existence of remarkable types, from
the greater frequency of the tattooed man to exceptionally
abnormal conditions of the frame and the organs, dating from
birth, together with many forms of contracted disease.
Finally, inquiries of a physiological nature into the reflex
action of the body, and especially into general and specific
sensibility, and sensibility to pain, and into reflex action under
external agencies, conducted with the aid of instruments which
record the results, have shown abnormal conditions, all tending to
physical insensibility, deep-seated and more or less
absolute, but incontestably different in kind from that which
obtains amongst the average men of the same social classes.
These are organic conditions, it must be at once affirmed, which
account as nothing else can for the undeniable fact of the
hereditary transmission of tendencies to crime, as well as of
predisposition to insanity, to suicide, and to other forms of
degeneration.
The second division of criminal anthropology, which is by far the
more important, with a more direct influence upon criminal
sociology, is the psychological study of the criminal. This
recognition of its greater importance does not prevent our critics
from concentrating their attack upon the organic characterisation
of criminals, in oblivion of the psychological characterisation,
which even in Lombroso's book occupies the larger part of the
text. [4]
[4] A recent example of this infatuation amongst one-sided, and
therefore ineffectual critics is the work of Colajanni,
``Socialism and Criminal Sociology,'' Catania, 1889. In the first
volume, which is devoted to criminal anthropology, out of four
hundred pages of argumentative criticism (which does not prevent
the author from taking our most fundamental conclusions on the
anthropological classification of criminals, and on crime, as
phenomena of psychical atavism), there are only six pages, 227-
232, for the criticism of psychological types.
Criminal psychology presents us with the characteristics which may
be called specially descriptive, such as the slang, the
handwriting, the secret symbols, the literature and art of the
criminal; and on the other hand it makes known to us the
characteristics which, in combination with organic abnormality,
account for the development of crime in the individual. And these
characteristics are grouped in two psychical and fundamental
abnormalities, namely, moral insensibility and want of foresight.
Moral insensibility, which is decidedly more congenital than
contracted, is either total or partial, and is displayed in
criminals who inflict personal injuries, as much as in others,
with a variety of symptoms which I have recorded elsewhere, and
which are eventually reduced to these conditions of the moral
sense in a large number of criminals--a lack of repugnance to the
idea and execution of the offence, previous to its commission, and
the absence of remorse after committing it.
Outside of these conditions of the moral sense, which is no
special sentiment, but an expression of the entire moral
constitution of the individual, as the temperament is of his
physiological constitution, other sentiments, of selfishness or
even of unselfishness, are not wanting in the majority of
criminals. Hence arise many illusions for superficial observers
of criminal life. But these latter sentiments are either
excessive, as hate, cupidity, vanity and the like, and are thus
stimulants to crime, or else, as with religion, love, honour,
loyalty, and so on, they cease to be forces antagonistic to crime,
because they have no foundation in a normal moral sense.
From this fundamental inferiority of sentiment there follows an
inferiority of intelligence, which, however, does not exclude
certain forms of craftiness, though it tends to inability to
foresee the consequences of crime, far in excess of what is
observed in the average members of the classes of society to which
the several criminals belong.
Thus the psychology of the criminal is summed up in a defective
resistance to criminal tendencies and temptations, due to that
ill-balanced impulsiveness which characterises children and
savages.
II.
I have long been convinced, by my study of works on criminal
anthropology, but especially by direct and continuous observation
from a physiological or a psychological point of view of a large
number of criminals, whether mad or of normal intelligence, that
the data of criminal anthropology are not entirely applicable, in
their complete and essential form, to all who commit crimes. They
are to be confined to a certain number, who may be called
congenital, incorrigible, and habitual criminals. But apart from
these there is a class of occasional criminals, who do not
exhibit, or who exhibit in slighter degrees, the anatomical,
physiological, and psychological characteristics which constitute
the type described by Lombroso as ``the criminal man. ''
Before further defining these two main classes of criminals, in
their natural and descriptive characterisation, I must add a
positive demonstration, which can be attested under two distinct
forms--(1) by the results of anthropological observation of
criminals, and (2) by statistics of relapse, and of the
manifestations of crime which anthropologists have hitherto
chiefly studied.
As for organic anomalies, as I cannot here treat the whole
matter in detail, I will simply reproduce from my study of
homicide a summary of results for a single category of these
anomalies, which a methodical observation of every class of
criminals will carry further and render more precise, as Lombroso
has already shown (see the fourth edition of his work, 1889, p.
273).
Homicides sentenced
To penal To Imprisonment Soldiers
servitude
Persons in whom I detected (346) (363) (711)
No anomaly in the skull 11. 9 p. c. 8. 2 p. c. 37. 2 p. c.
One or two anomalies 47. 2 '' 56. 6 '' 51. 8 ''
Three or four anomalies 30. 9 '' 2. 6 '' 11 ''
Five or six anomalies 6. 7 '' 2. 3 '' 0 ''
Seven or more anomalies . 3 '' . 3 '' 0 ''
That is to say, men with normal skulls were three times as
numerous amongst soldiers as they were amongst criminals; of men
with a noteworthy number of anomalies occurring together (three or
four), there were three times as many amongst criminals as amongst
soldiers; and there was not one soldier amongst those who showed
an extraordinary number (five or more).
This proves to demonstration not only the greater frequency of
anomalous skulls (and the same is true of physiognomical,
physiological, and psychological anomalies) amongst criminals, but
also that amongst these criminals between fifty and sixty per
cent. show very few anomalies, whilst about one-third of the whole
number present a remarkable combination, and one-tenth are normal
in this respect.
Amongst the statistical data exhibiting the primary
characteristics of the majority of criminals, the data connected
with relapsed criminals are especially conspicuous. Though
relapses, like first offences, are partly due to social
conditions, they also have a manifest biological cause, since,
under the operation of the same penal system, there are some
liberated prisoners who relapse and some who do not.
The statistics of relapse are unfortunately very difficult to
collect, on account of differences in the legislation of different
countries, and in the preparation of records, which, even under
the more general adoption of anthropometrical identification,
rarely succeed in preventing the use of fresh names by
professional criminals. So that we may still say, in the words of
one who is a very good judge in this matter, M. Yvernes, not
only that ``the Prisons Congress of London (1872) was compelled to
leave various problems undecided for lack of documentary evidence,
and especially the question of relapsed criminals,'' but also that
to this day (1879), ``we find varying results in different
countries, the exact significance of which is not apparent. ''
I have, however, published an essay on international statistics of
relapsed criminals, from which I drew the following general
conclusion: that even in prison statistics, which often give
higher totals of relapsed cases than are given by judicial
statistics, because they are more personal, and therefore less
uncertain, we never obtain the full number of relapses, though the
totals given vary from country to country, from district to
district, and from prison to prison. It would be impossible
to state accurately what proportion the numbers given bear to the
actual number; but I am justified in saying, from all the
materials which I have collected and compared in the aforesaid
essay, that the number of relapses in Europe is generally between
50 and 60 per cent. , and certainly rather above than below this
limit. Whilst the Italian statistics, for instance, give 14 per
cent. of relapses amongst prisoners sentenced to penal servitude,
I found by experience 37 per cent; out of 346 who admitted to me
that they had relapsed; and, amongst those who had been sentenced
to simple imprisonment, I found 60 per cent. out of 363, in place
of the 33 per cent. recorded in the prison statistics. The
difference may be due to the particular conditions of the prisons
which I visited; but in any case it establishes the inadequacy of
the official figures dealing with relapse.
After this statement of a general fact, which proves, as Lombroso
and Espinas said, that ``the relapsed criminal is the rule rather
than the exception,'' we can proceed to set down the special
proportions of relapse for each particular crime, so as to obtain
an indication of the forms of crime which are most frequently
resorted to by habitual criminals.
For Italy I have found that the highest percentages of relapse are
afforded by persons convicted of theft and petty larceny, forgery,
rape, manslaughter, conspiracy, and, at the correctional courts,
vagrancy and mendacity. The lowest percentages are amongst those
convicted of assault and bodily harm, murders, and infanticide.
For France, where legal statistics are remarkably adapted for the
most minute inquiry, I have drawn up the following table of
statistics from the lists of persons convicted at the assize
courts and correctional tribunals, taking an average of the years
1877-81, which is not sensibly affected by the results of
succeeding years.
It will be seen that the average of relapses for crimes against
the person is higher than the average for the most serious cases
of murderous and indecent assault, which are clearly an outcome of
the most anti-social tendencies (such as parricide, murder, rape,
inflicting bodily harm on parents, &c. ). Thus homicide and fatal
wounding, though relapse is very frequent in these cases, still
display a less abnormal and more occasional character by their
lower position in the table, as shown in the cases of infanticide,
concealment of birth, and abandonment of infants. As for the very
frequent occurrence of relapse in special crimes, such as assaults
on officials and resistance to authority, which rarely come before
the assize courts--though even there they tend to support the
higher numbers in the tribunals--these are offences which may also
be committed by criminals of every kind, and which, moreover,
depend in some measure on the social factor of police
organisation, and frequently on the psycho-pathological state of
particular individuals.
The somewhat rare occurrence of relapse in such a grave type of
murder as poisoning is noteworthy. But this is only an effect of
the special psychology of these criminals, as I have explained
elsewhere.
FRANCE--CASES OF RELAPSE, 1877-81.
COURTS OF ASSIZE
CRIMES
(Against the person) p. 100
Violence against public officers 85. 8
Bigamy 59. 3
Wounding parents or grandparents 55. 9
Riot 55. 3
Kidnapping of minors 46. 2
Sexual assault on adults 44. 0
Wilful murder (assassination) 42. 3
Parricide 41. 7
Manslaughter (homicide) 39. 4
Sexual assaults on children 38. 5
Attempts against railways 37. 5
Serious wounds followed by death 36. 8
----
General average 35. 8
Abortion 30. 0
Perjury 26. 7
Sequestration 18. 8
Poisoning 16. 7
Infanticide 6. 0
Stealing, substitution or abandoning children 4. 9
CRIMES
(Against property) p. 100
Theft in churches 74. 3
Thefts, simple 71. 7
Robbery, with violence, not on the highway 66. 0
Burning buildings not inhabited, woods, etc. 59. 8
----
General average 58. 5
Barratry 50. 0
Theft by servants 44. 2
Counterfeiting 43. 8
Forgery, private writings 42. 5
Burning inhabited dwellings 41. 5
Forgery, commercial paper 38. 3
Forgery, public documents 37. 0
Fraudulent bankruptcy 35. 3
Abuse of confidence by domestic servant 32. 5
Extortion 30. 7
Embezzlement of public funds 28. 5
Robbing the mails by postal employees
Smuggling by customs officers
CORRECTIONAL TRIBUNALS
DELICTS p. 100
Infractions of surveillance 100
Infractions of expulsion of foreign fugitives 93. 0
Infractions of interdiction to sojourn 89. 0
Drunkenness 78. 4
Vagabondage 71. 3
Begging 65. 7
Fraud (escroquerie) 47. 8
Insult to public officers 46. 8
Forcible entry 45. 3
Thefts 45. 2
Breach of trust 43. 8
----
General average 41. 9
Riot, resistance 40. 3
Written or verbal threats 39. 6
Prohibited weapons, etc. 37. 3
Political, electoral, and newspaper delicts 35. 7
Outrage to public morality 34. 5
Public outrage to decency 32. 2
Voluntary wounds and blows 31. 0
Unlawful opening of cafes, inns 27. 7
Unlawful practice of medicine or pharmacy 26. 6
Contraventions of railway regulations 25. 3
Hunting or carrying prohibited arms 24. 2
Breach of good morals, tending to corruption 23. 8
Simple bankruptcy 23. 6
Insult to ministers of religion 20. 4
Fraudulent sales of merchandise 16. 7
Defamations, insults, calumnies 14. 2
Rural delicts 12. 0
Amongst crimes against property, the most frequent relapses are
found in the case of thieves (not including thefts and breaches of
trust by domestic servants, which thus, proving their more
occasional character, confirm the agreement of statistics with
criminal psychology). The same thing is observed in regard to
forgers of commercial documents and to fraudulent bankrupts, who
are partly drawn into crime under the stress of personal or
general crises. And the infrequency of relapse amongst postal
employees condemned for embezzlement, and amongst customs officers
who have been guilty of smuggling, is only a further confirmation
of the inducement to crime by the opportunities met with in each
case, rather than by personal tendencies.
Amongst minor offences, apart from that evasion of supervision
which is no more than a legal condition, there are, both in France
and in Italy, very frequent cases of relapse by vagabonds and
mendicants, which is a consequence of social environment, as well
as of the feeble organisation of the individuals. Other relapses
above the average, included amongst these offences, constitute a
sort of accessory criminality, existing side by side with the
habitual criminality of thieves, murderers, and the like, such as
drunkenness, attacks on public functionaries, infractions of the
regulations of domicile, &c.
In thefts and resistance to authorities, relapse is less frequent
here than in the assize courts, for in the majority of these minor
offences, in their general forms, there is a greater number of
occasional offences, as is also the case with bankruptcies,
defamation, abuse, rural offences, &c. , which demonstrate
their more occasional character by their very low figures.
Hence the statistics of general and specific relapse indirectly
confirm the fact that criminals, as a whole, have no uniform
anthropological type; and that the bio-psychical types and
anomalies belong more especially to the category of habitual
criminals and those born into the criminal class, who, after all,
are the only ones hitherto studied by criminal anthropologists.
What, then, is the numerical proportion of habitual criminals to
the aggregate number of criminals?
In the absence of direct inquiry, it is possible to get at this
proportion indirectly, from facts of two kinds. In the first
place, a study of the works on criminal anthropology supplies us
with an approximate figure, since the biological characteristics
united in individuals, in sufficient number to create a criminal
type, are met with in between forty and fifty per cent. of the
total.
And this conclusion may be confirmed by other data of criminal
statistics.
Whilst the statistics of relapse give us a very limited number of
crimes and offences committed by born and habitual criminals,
science and criminal legislation give us a far more extended
classification.
Ellero reckoned in the penal code of the German Empire 203 crimes
and offences; and I find that the Italian code of 1859 enumerates
about 180, the new code about 200, and the French penal code about
150. Thus the kind of crimes of habitual criminals would
only be about one-tenth of the complete legal classification of
crimes and offences.
It is easy indeed to suppose that born and habitual criminals do
not generally commit political crimes and offences, nor offences
connected with the press, nor against freedom of worship, nor in
corruption of public functionaries, nor misuse of title or
authority; nor calumny, making false attestations or false
reports; nor adultery, incest, or abduction of minors; nor
infanticide, abortion, or palming of children; nor betrayal of
professional secrets; nor bankruptcy offences, nor damage to
property, nor violation of domicile, nor illegal arrests, nor
duels, nor defamation, nor abuse. I say generally; for, as there
are occasional criminals who commit the offences characteristic of
habitual criminality, such as homicides, robberies, rapes, &c. , so
there are born criminals who sometimes commit crimes out of their
ordinary course.
It is now necessary to add a few statistical data in respect of
the classification of crime, which I take, like the others, from
the essay already mentioned.
HABITUAL CRIMINALITY ITALY. FRANCE. BELGIUM.
(homicide, theft, conspiracy,
rape, incendiarism,
vagrancy, swindling) A* B* C* A* B* C* A* B* C*
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Proportion of the persons p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c.
convicted of these crimes
and offences to the total
number of convictions . . 84 32 38 90 34 35 86 30 30
{* NOTE: A, B and C above are `Assizes,' `Tribunals,' and `Totals,'
respectively. }
That is to say, habitual criminality would be represented, in
Italy, by about 40 per cent.
of the total number of condemned
persons, and by somewhat less in France and Belgium. This would
be accounted for in Belgium by the exclusion of vagrancy; but the
difference is virtually due to the greater frequency in Italy of
certain crimes, such as homicide, highway robbery with violence,
and conspiracies.
Further, it is apparent that in all these countries the types of
habitual criminality, with the exception of thefts and vagrancy,
are in greater proportion at the assizes, on account of their
serious character.
The actual totals, however, are larger at the tribunals, for as,
in the scale of animal life, the greatest fecundity belongs to the
lower and smaller forms, so in the criminal scale, the less
serious offences (such as simple theft, swindling, vagrancy, &c. )
are the more numerous. Thus, out of the total of 38 per cent. in
Italy, 32 belong to the tribunals and 6 to the assizes; out of 35
per cent in France, 33 belong to the tribunals and 2 to the
assizes; and out of 30 per cent. in Belgium, 29 belong to the
tribunals and 1 to the assizes. This also is partly accounted for
by legislative distinctions as to the respective jurisdictions of
these courts.
As to the particulars of the totals, it is found that thefts are
the most numerous types in Italy (20 per cent. ), in France (24 per
cent. ), in Belgium (23 per cent. ), and in Prussia (37 per cent. ,
including breaches of trust). [5]
[5] Starke, ``Verbrechen und Verbrecher in Preussen,'' Berlin,
1884, p. 92.
After theft, the most numerous in Italy are vagrancy (5 per
cent. ), homicides (4 per cent. ), swindling (3 per cent. ), forgery
(. 9 per cent. ), rape (. 4 per cent. ), conspiracy (. 4 per cent. ),
and incendiarism (. 2 per cent. ).
In France and Belgium we find the same relative frequency of
vagrancy and swindling; but homicide, incendiarism, and conspiracy
are less frequent, whilst rape is more common in France (. 5 per
cent. ) and in Belgium (1 per cent. ).
Such then are the most frequent forms of habitual criminality in
the generality of condemned persons; and it will be useful now to
contrast the more frequent forms of occasional criminality. For
Italy the only judicial statistics which are valuable for detailed
inquiry are those of 1863, 1869-72. For France, every volume of
the admirable series of criminal statistics may be utilised.
It will be seen that the frequency of these occasional crimes and
offences in Italy and in France is very variable, though assaults
and wounding, resistance to authorities, damage, defamation and
abuse, are the most numerous in both countries.
The proportion of each offence to the total also varies
considerably, not only through a difference of legislation between
Italy and France in regard to poaching, drunkenness, frauds on
refreshment-house keepers, and so forth, but also by reason of the
different condition of individuals and of society in the two
countries. Thus assaults and wounding, which in Italy comprise 23
per cent. of the total of convictions, reach in France no more
than 14 per cent. , whilst resistance to the authorities, &c. ,
which
YEARLY AVERAGE or CONDEMNED
PERSONS.
ITALY, 1863-72. FRANCE
1877-81
CRIMES AND OFFENCES OF GREATEST
FREQUENCY
(not including those of Habitual Criminals).
p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c.
Wilful Assault and Wounding . . .
Illegally carrying Arms . . . . . . -- 8 7 -- 3 3
Resistance to Authority, Assaults and
Violence against Public Functionaries . . . 3 5 4 --2 10 10
Injury to Property . . . . . . . . . -- 2 2 -- I 1-6 1 5
Defamation and Abuse . . . . . . . . . -- s-S 1-6 -- I-6 1 5
Written or Spoken Threats . . . . . . -- 1 4 1'2 -- '2 --2
Illegal Games . . . . . . . . . . . . -- I --8 -- 2 1 'I
Political Crimes and Offences . . . . . . 31. 7 -- --2 -- 4 2 --2
Press Crimes and Offences . . . . . . 4 4 --4 -- --6 --6
Embezzlement, Corruption, Malfeasance
of Public Functionaries -- --3 . 3 -- -- --
Escape from Detention --1 --2 2 -- --6 --6
False Witness . . . . . . . . . . . --7 2 --2 09 6 --6
Violation of Domicile . . . . . . . . . -- 17 . 15 -- lo --9
Calumny . . . --. --1 I 1 --oS --o8
Exposure, Palming or ``Suppression''
of Infants -- --12 1 --2 --1 --1
Bankruptcy Offences . . . . . . . . . I 1 --1 1'3 5 --6
Offences against Religion and Ministers
of Religion -- 1 --1 -- --7 . 07
Duelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- . 04 . 03 -- -- --
Abortion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- -- -- og -- --OI
Offences against the Game Laws -- -- -- -- 13 12-7
Drunkenness -- -- -- -- 1 5 1 5
Offences against Public Decency -- -- -- -- I-8 1. 7
Adultery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- -- -- --5 5
Offences against Morality, with Incitement
to Immorality . . . .
psychical characteristics is the special work of this new science
of criminal anthropology.
Now these data, which are the conclusions of the anthropologist,
are but starting-points for the criminal sociologist, from which
he has to reach his legal and social conclusions. Criminal
anthropology is to criminal sociology, in its scientific
function, what the biological sciences, in description and
experimentation, are to clinical practice.
In other words, the criminal sociologist is not in duty bound to
conduct for himself the inquiries of criminal anthropology, just
as the clinical operator is not bound to be a physiologist or an
anatomist. No doubt the direct observation of criminals is a very
serviceable study, even for the criminal sociologist; but the only
duty of the latter is to base his legal and social inferences upon
the positive data of criminal anthropology for the biological
aspects of crime, and upon statistical data for the influences of
physical and social environment, instead of contenting himself
with mere abstract legal syllogisms.
On the other hand it is clear that sundry questions which have a
direct bearing upon criminal anthropology--as, for instance, in
regard to some particular biological characteristic, or to its
evolutionary significance--have no immediate obligation or value
for criminal sociology, which employs only the fundamental and
most indubitable data of criminal anthropology. So that it is but
a clumsy way of propounding the question to ask, as it is too
frequently asked: ``What connection can there be between the
cephalic index, or the transverse measurement of a murderer's jaw,
and his responsibility for the crime which he has committed? ''
The scientific function of the anthropological data is a very
different thing, and the only legitimate question which sociology
can put to anthropology is this:--``Is the criminal, and in what
respects is he, a normal or an abnormal man? And if he is,
or when he is abnormal, whence is the abnormality derived? Is it
congenital or contracted, capable or incapable of rectification? ''
This is all; and yet it is sufficient to enable the student of
crime to arrive at positive conclusions concerning the measures
which society can take in order to defend itself against crime;
whilst he can draw other conclusions from criminal statistics.
As for the principal data hitherto established by criminal
anthropology, whilst we must refer the reader for detailed
information to the works of specialists, we may repeat that this
new science studies the criminal in his organic and in his
psychical constitution, for these are the two inseparable aspects
of human existence.
A beginning has naturally been made with the organic study of the
criminal, both anatomical and physiological, since we must study
the organ before the function, and the physical before the moral.
This, however, has given rise to a host of misconceptions and one-
sided criticisms, which have not yet ceased; for criminal
anthropology has been charged, by such as consider only the most
conspicuous data with narrowing crime down to the mere result of
conformations of the skull or convolutions of the brain. The fact
is that purely morphological observations are but preliminary
steps to the histological and physiological study of the brain,
and of the body as a whole.
As for craniology, especially in regard to the two distinct and
characteristic types of criminals--murderers and thieves, an
incontestable inferiority has been noted in the shape of the head,
by comparison with normal men, together with a greater frequency
of hereditary and pathological departures from the normal type.
Similarly an examination of the brains of criminals, whilst it
reveals in them an inferiority of form and histological type,
gives also, in a great majority of cases, indications of disease
which were frequently undetected in their lifetime. Thus M.
Dally, who for twenty years past has displayed exceptional acumen
in problems of this kind, said that ``all the criminals who had
been subjected to autopsy (after execution) gave evidence of
cerebral injury. ''[3]
[3] In a discussion at the Medico-Psychological Society of Paris;
``Proceedings'' for 1881, i. 93, 266, 280, 483.
Observations of the physiognomy of criminals, which no one will
undervalue who has studied criminals in their lifetime, with
adequate knowledge, as well as other physical inquiries, external
and internal, have shown the existence of remarkable types, from
the greater frequency of the tattooed man to exceptionally
abnormal conditions of the frame and the organs, dating from
birth, together with many forms of contracted disease.
Finally, inquiries of a physiological nature into the reflex
action of the body, and especially into general and specific
sensibility, and sensibility to pain, and into reflex action under
external agencies, conducted with the aid of instruments which
record the results, have shown abnormal conditions, all tending to
physical insensibility, deep-seated and more or less
absolute, but incontestably different in kind from that which
obtains amongst the average men of the same social classes.
These are organic conditions, it must be at once affirmed, which
account as nothing else can for the undeniable fact of the
hereditary transmission of tendencies to crime, as well as of
predisposition to insanity, to suicide, and to other forms of
degeneration.
The second division of criminal anthropology, which is by far the
more important, with a more direct influence upon criminal
sociology, is the psychological study of the criminal. This
recognition of its greater importance does not prevent our critics
from concentrating their attack upon the organic characterisation
of criminals, in oblivion of the psychological characterisation,
which even in Lombroso's book occupies the larger part of the
text. [4]
[4] A recent example of this infatuation amongst one-sided, and
therefore ineffectual critics is the work of Colajanni,
``Socialism and Criminal Sociology,'' Catania, 1889. In the first
volume, which is devoted to criminal anthropology, out of four
hundred pages of argumentative criticism (which does not prevent
the author from taking our most fundamental conclusions on the
anthropological classification of criminals, and on crime, as
phenomena of psychical atavism), there are only six pages, 227-
232, for the criticism of psychological types.
Criminal psychology presents us with the characteristics which may
be called specially descriptive, such as the slang, the
handwriting, the secret symbols, the literature and art of the
criminal; and on the other hand it makes known to us the
characteristics which, in combination with organic abnormality,
account for the development of crime in the individual. And these
characteristics are grouped in two psychical and fundamental
abnormalities, namely, moral insensibility and want of foresight.
Moral insensibility, which is decidedly more congenital than
contracted, is either total or partial, and is displayed in
criminals who inflict personal injuries, as much as in others,
with a variety of symptoms which I have recorded elsewhere, and
which are eventually reduced to these conditions of the moral
sense in a large number of criminals--a lack of repugnance to the
idea and execution of the offence, previous to its commission, and
the absence of remorse after committing it.
Outside of these conditions of the moral sense, which is no
special sentiment, but an expression of the entire moral
constitution of the individual, as the temperament is of his
physiological constitution, other sentiments, of selfishness or
even of unselfishness, are not wanting in the majority of
criminals. Hence arise many illusions for superficial observers
of criminal life. But these latter sentiments are either
excessive, as hate, cupidity, vanity and the like, and are thus
stimulants to crime, or else, as with religion, love, honour,
loyalty, and so on, they cease to be forces antagonistic to crime,
because they have no foundation in a normal moral sense.
From this fundamental inferiority of sentiment there follows an
inferiority of intelligence, which, however, does not exclude
certain forms of craftiness, though it tends to inability to
foresee the consequences of crime, far in excess of what is
observed in the average members of the classes of society to which
the several criminals belong.
Thus the psychology of the criminal is summed up in a defective
resistance to criminal tendencies and temptations, due to that
ill-balanced impulsiveness which characterises children and
savages.
II.
I have long been convinced, by my study of works on criminal
anthropology, but especially by direct and continuous observation
from a physiological or a psychological point of view of a large
number of criminals, whether mad or of normal intelligence, that
the data of criminal anthropology are not entirely applicable, in
their complete and essential form, to all who commit crimes. They
are to be confined to a certain number, who may be called
congenital, incorrigible, and habitual criminals. But apart from
these there is a class of occasional criminals, who do not
exhibit, or who exhibit in slighter degrees, the anatomical,
physiological, and psychological characteristics which constitute
the type described by Lombroso as ``the criminal man. ''
Before further defining these two main classes of criminals, in
their natural and descriptive characterisation, I must add a
positive demonstration, which can be attested under two distinct
forms--(1) by the results of anthropological observation of
criminals, and (2) by statistics of relapse, and of the
manifestations of crime which anthropologists have hitherto
chiefly studied.
As for organic anomalies, as I cannot here treat the whole
matter in detail, I will simply reproduce from my study of
homicide a summary of results for a single category of these
anomalies, which a methodical observation of every class of
criminals will carry further and render more precise, as Lombroso
has already shown (see the fourth edition of his work, 1889, p.
273).
Homicides sentenced
To penal To Imprisonment Soldiers
servitude
Persons in whom I detected (346) (363) (711)
No anomaly in the skull 11. 9 p. c. 8. 2 p. c. 37. 2 p. c.
One or two anomalies 47. 2 '' 56. 6 '' 51. 8 ''
Three or four anomalies 30. 9 '' 2. 6 '' 11 ''
Five or six anomalies 6. 7 '' 2. 3 '' 0 ''
Seven or more anomalies . 3 '' . 3 '' 0 ''
That is to say, men with normal skulls were three times as
numerous amongst soldiers as they were amongst criminals; of men
with a noteworthy number of anomalies occurring together (three or
four), there were three times as many amongst criminals as amongst
soldiers; and there was not one soldier amongst those who showed
an extraordinary number (five or more).
This proves to demonstration not only the greater frequency of
anomalous skulls (and the same is true of physiognomical,
physiological, and psychological anomalies) amongst criminals, but
also that amongst these criminals between fifty and sixty per
cent. show very few anomalies, whilst about one-third of the whole
number present a remarkable combination, and one-tenth are normal
in this respect.
Amongst the statistical data exhibiting the primary
characteristics of the majority of criminals, the data connected
with relapsed criminals are especially conspicuous. Though
relapses, like first offences, are partly due to social
conditions, they also have a manifest biological cause, since,
under the operation of the same penal system, there are some
liberated prisoners who relapse and some who do not.
The statistics of relapse are unfortunately very difficult to
collect, on account of differences in the legislation of different
countries, and in the preparation of records, which, even under
the more general adoption of anthropometrical identification,
rarely succeed in preventing the use of fresh names by
professional criminals. So that we may still say, in the words of
one who is a very good judge in this matter, M. Yvernes, not
only that ``the Prisons Congress of London (1872) was compelled to
leave various problems undecided for lack of documentary evidence,
and especially the question of relapsed criminals,'' but also that
to this day (1879), ``we find varying results in different
countries, the exact significance of which is not apparent. ''
I have, however, published an essay on international statistics of
relapsed criminals, from which I drew the following general
conclusion: that even in prison statistics, which often give
higher totals of relapsed cases than are given by judicial
statistics, because they are more personal, and therefore less
uncertain, we never obtain the full number of relapses, though the
totals given vary from country to country, from district to
district, and from prison to prison. It would be impossible
to state accurately what proportion the numbers given bear to the
actual number; but I am justified in saying, from all the
materials which I have collected and compared in the aforesaid
essay, that the number of relapses in Europe is generally between
50 and 60 per cent. , and certainly rather above than below this
limit. Whilst the Italian statistics, for instance, give 14 per
cent. of relapses amongst prisoners sentenced to penal servitude,
I found by experience 37 per cent; out of 346 who admitted to me
that they had relapsed; and, amongst those who had been sentenced
to simple imprisonment, I found 60 per cent. out of 363, in place
of the 33 per cent. recorded in the prison statistics. The
difference may be due to the particular conditions of the prisons
which I visited; but in any case it establishes the inadequacy of
the official figures dealing with relapse.
After this statement of a general fact, which proves, as Lombroso
and Espinas said, that ``the relapsed criminal is the rule rather
than the exception,'' we can proceed to set down the special
proportions of relapse for each particular crime, so as to obtain
an indication of the forms of crime which are most frequently
resorted to by habitual criminals.
For Italy I have found that the highest percentages of relapse are
afforded by persons convicted of theft and petty larceny, forgery,
rape, manslaughter, conspiracy, and, at the correctional courts,
vagrancy and mendacity. The lowest percentages are amongst those
convicted of assault and bodily harm, murders, and infanticide.
For France, where legal statistics are remarkably adapted for the
most minute inquiry, I have drawn up the following table of
statistics from the lists of persons convicted at the assize
courts and correctional tribunals, taking an average of the years
1877-81, which is not sensibly affected by the results of
succeeding years.
It will be seen that the average of relapses for crimes against
the person is higher than the average for the most serious cases
of murderous and indecent assault, which are clearly an outcome of
the most anti-social tendencies (such as parricide, murder, rape,
inflicting bodily harm on parents, &c. ). Thus homicide and fatal
wounding, though relapse is very frequent in these cases, still
display a less abnormal and more occasional character by their
lower position in the table, as shown in the cases of infanticide,
concealment of birth, and abandonment of infants. As for the very
frequent occurrence of relapse in special crimes, such as assaults
on officials and resistance to authority, which rarely come before
the assize courts--though even there they tend to support the
higher numbers in the tribunals--these are offences which may also
be committed by criminals of every kind, and which, moreover,
depend in some measure on the social factor of police
organisation, and frequently on the psycho-pathological state of
particular individuals.
The somewhat rare occurrence of relapse in such a grave type of
murder as poisoning is noteworthy. But this is only an effect of
the special psychology of these criminals, as I have explained
elsewhere.
FRANCE--CASES OF RELAPSE, 1877-81.
COURTS OF ASSIZE
CRIMES
(Against the person) p. 100
Violence against public officers 85. 8
Bigamy 59. 3
Wounding parents or grandparents 55. 9
Riot 55. 3
Kidnapping of minors 46. 2
Sexual assault on adults 44. 0
Wilful murder (assassination) 42. 3
Parricide 41. 7
Manslaughter (homicide) 39. 4
Sexual assaults on children 38. 5
Attempts against railways 37. 5
Serious wounds followed by death 36. 8
----
General average 35. 8
Abortion 30. 0
Perjury 26. 7
Sequestration 18. 8
Poisoning 16. 7
Infanticide 6. 0
Stealing, substitution or abandoning children 4. 9
CRIMES
(Against property) p. 100
Theft in churches 74. 3
Thefts, simple 71. 7
Robbery, with violence, not on the highway 66. 0
Burning buildings not inhabited, woods, etc. 59. 8
----
General average 58. 5
Barratry 50. 0
Theft by servants 44. 2
Counterfeiting 43. 8
Forgery, private writings 42. 5
Burning inhabited dwellings 41. 5
Forgery, commercial paper 38. 3
Forgery, public documents 37. 0
Fraudulent bankruptcy 35. 3
Abuse of confidence by domestic servant 32. 5
Extortion 30. 7
Embezzlement of public funds 28. 5
Robbing the mails by postal employees
Smuggling by customs officers
CORRECTIONAL TRIBUNALS
DELICTS p. 100
Infractions of surveillance 100
Infractions of expulsion of foreign fugitives 93. 0
Infractions of interdiction to sojourn 89. 0
Drunkenness 78. 4
Vagabondage 71. 3
Begging 65. 7
Fraud (escroquerie) 47. 8
Insult to public officers 46. 8
Forcible entry 45. 3
Thefts 45. 2
Breach of trust 43. 8
----
General average 41. 9
Riot, resistance 40. 3
Written or verbal threats 39. 6
Prohibited weapons, etc. 37. 3
Political, electoral, and newspaper delicts 35. 7
Outrage to public morality 34. 5
Public outrage to decency 32. 2
Voluntary wounds and blows 31. 0
Unlawful opening of cafes, inns 27. 7
Unlawful practice of medicine or pharmacy 26. 6
Contraventions of railway regulations 25. 3
Hunting or carrying prohibited arms 24. 2
Breach of good morals, tending to corruption 23. 8
Simple bankruptcy 23. 6
Insult to ministers of religion 20. 4
Fraudulent sales of merchandise 16. 7
Defamations, insults, calumnies 14. 2
Rural delicts 12. 0
Amongst crimes against property, the most frequent relapses are
found in the case of thieves (not including thefts and breaches of
trust by domestic servants, which thus, proving their more
occasional character, confirm the agreement of statistics with
criminal psychology). The same thing is observed in regard to
forgers of commercial documents and to fraudulent bankrupts, who
are partly drawn into crime under the stress of personal or
general crises. And the infrequency of relapse amongst postal
employees condemned for embezzlement, and amongst customs officers
who have been guilty of smuggling, is only a further confirmation
of the inducement to crime by the opportunities met with in each
case, rather than by personal tendencies.
Amongst minor offences, apart from that evasion of supervision
which is no more than a legal condition, there are, both in France
and in Italy, very frequent cases of relapse by vagabonds and
mendicants, which is a consequence of social environment, as well
as of the feeble organisation of the individuals. Other relapses
above the average, included amongst these offences, constitute a
sort of accessory criminality, existing side by side with the
habitual criminality of thieves, murderers, and the like, such as
drunkenness, attacks on public functionaries, infractions of the
regulations of domicile, &c.
In thefts and resistance to authorities, relapse is less frequent
here than in the assize courts, for in the majority of these minor
offences, in their general forms, there is a greater number of
occasional offences, as is also the case with bankruptcies,
defamation, abuse, rural offences, &c. , which demonstrate
their more occasional character by their very low figures.
Hence the statistics of general and specific relapse indirectly
confirm the fact that criminals, as a whole, have no uniform
anthropological type; and that the bio-psychical types and
anomalies belong more especially to the category of habitual
criminals and those born into the criminal class, who, after all,
are the only ones hitherto studied by criminal anthropologists.
What, then, is the numerical proportion of habitual criminals to
the aggregate number of criminals?
In the absence of direct inquiry, it is possible to get at this
proportion indirectly, from facts of two kinds. In the first
place, a study of the works on criminal anthropology supplies us
with an approximate figure, since the biological characteristics
united in individuals, in sufficient number to create a criminal
type, are met with in between forty and fifty per cent. of the
total.
And this conclusion may be confirmed by other data of criminal
statistics.
Whilst the statistics of relapse give us a very limited number of
crimes and offences committed by born and habitual criminals,
science and criminal legislation give us a far more extended
classification.
Ellero reckoned in the penal code of the German Empire 203 crimes
and offences; and I find that the Italian code of 1859 enumerates
about 180, the new code about 200, and the French penal code about
150. Thus the kind of crimes of habitual criminals would
only be about one-tenth of the complete legal classification of
crimes and offences.
It is easy indeed to suppose that born and habitual criminals do
not generally commit political crimes and offences, nor offences
connected with the press, nor against freedom of worship, nor in
corruption of public functionaries, nor misuse of title or
authority; nor calumny, making false attestations or false
reports; nor adultery, incest, or abduction of minors; nor
infanticide, abortion, or palming of children; nor betrayal of
professional secrets; nor bankruptcy offences, nor damage to
property, nor violation of domicile, nor illegal arrests, nor
duels, nor defamation, nor abuse. I say generally; for, as there
are occasional criminals who commit the offences characteristic of
habitual criminality, such as homicides, robberies, rapes, &c. , so
there are born criminals who sometimes commit crimes out of their
ordinary course.
It is now necessary to add a few statistical data in respect of
the classification of crime, which I take, like the others, from
the essay already mentioned.
HABITUAL CRIMINALITY ITALY. FRANCE. BELGIUM.
(homicide, theft, conspiracy,
rape, incendiarism,
vagrancy, swindling) A* B* C* A* B* C* A* B* C*
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Proportion of the persons p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c.
convicted of these crimes
and offences to the total
number of convictions . . 84 32 38 90 34 35 86 30 30
{* NOTE: A, B and C above are `Assizes,' `Tribunals,' and `Totals,'
respectively. }
That is to say, habitual criminality would be represented, in
Italy, by about 40 per cent.
of the total number of condemned
persons, and by somewhat less in France and Belgium. This would
be accounted for in Belgium by the exclusion of vagrancy; but the
difference is virtually due to the greater frequency in Italy of
certain crimes, such as homicide, highway robbery with violence,
and conspiracies.
Further, it is apparent that in all these countries the types of
habitual criminality, with the exception of thefts and vagrancy,
are in greater proportion at the assizes, on account of their
serious character.
The actual totals, however, are larger at the tribunals, for as,
in the scale of animal life, the greatest fecundity belongs to the
lower and smaller forms, so in the criminal scale, the less
serious offences (such as simple theft, swindling, vagrancy, &c. )
are the more numerous. Thus, out of the total of 38 per cent. in
Italy, 32 belong to the tribunals and 6 to the assizes; out of 35
per cent in France, 33 belong to the tribunals and 2 to the
assizes; and out of 30 per cent. in Belgium, 29 belong to the
tribunals and 1 to the assizes. This also is partly accounted for
by legislative distinctions as to the respective jurisdictions of
these courts.
As to the particulars of the totals, it is found that thefts are
the most numerous types in Italy (20 per cent. ), in France (24 per
cent. ), in Belgium (23 per cent. ), and in Prussia (37 per cent. ,
including breaches of trust). [5]
[5] Starke, ``Verbrechen und Verbrecher in Preussen,'' Berlin,
1884, p. 92.
After theft, the most numerous in Italy are vagrancy (5 per
cent. ), homicides (4 per cent. ), swindling (3 per cent. ), forgery
(. 9 per cent. ), rape (. 4 per cent. ), conspiracy (. 4 per cent. ),
and incendiarism (. 2 per cent. ).
In France and Belgium we find the same relative frequency of
vagrancy and swindling; but homicide, incendiarism, and conspiracy
are less frequent, whilst rape is more common in France (. 5 per
cent. ) and in Belgium (1 per cent. ).
Such then are the most frequent forms of habitual criminality in
the generality of condemned persons; and it will be useful now to
contrast the more frequent forms of occasional criminality. For
Italy the only judicial statistics which are valuable for detailed
inquiry are those of 1863, 1869-72. For France, every volume of
the admirable series of criminal statistics may be utilised.
It will be seen that the frequency of these occasional crimes and
offences in Italy and in France is very variable, though assaults
and wounding, resistance to authorities, damage, defamation and
abuse, are the most numerous in both countries.
The proportion of each offence to the total also varies
considerably, not only through a difference of legislation between
Italy and France in regard to poaching, drunkenness, frauds on
refreshment-house keepers, and so forth, but also by reason of the
different condition of individuals and of society in the two
countries. Thus assaults and wounding, which in Italy comprise 23
per cent. of the total of convictions, reach in France no more
than 14 per cent. , whilst resistance to the authorities, &c. ,
which
YEARLY AVERAGE or CONDEMNED
PERSONS.
ITALY, 1863-72. FRANCE
1877-81
CRIMES AND OFFENCES OF GREATEST
FREQUENCY
(not including those of Habitual Criminals).
p. c. p. c. p. c. p. c.
Wilful Assault and Wounding . . .
Illegally carrying Arms . . . . . . -- 8 7 -- 3 3
Resistance to Authority, Assaults and
Violence against Public Functionaries . . . 3 5 4 --2 10 10
Injury to Property . . . . . . . . . -- 2 2 -- I 1-6 1 5
Defamation and Abuse . . . . . . . . . -- s-S 1-6 -- I-6 1 5
Written or Spoken Threats . . . . . . -- 1 4 1'2 -- '2 --2
Illegal Games . . . . . . . . . . . . -- I --8 -- 2 1 'I
Political Crimes and Offences . . . . . . 31. 7 -- --2 -- 4 2 --2
Press Crimes and Offences . . . . . . 4 4 --4 -- --6 --6
Embezzlement, Corruption, Malfeasance
of Public Functionaries -- --3 . 3 -- -- --
Escape from Detention --1 --2 2 -- --6 --6
False Witness . . . . . . . . . . . --7 2 --2 09 6 --6
Violation of Domicile . . . . . . . . . -- 17 . 15 -- lo --9
Calumny . . . --. --1 I 1 --oS --o8
Exposure, Palming or ``Suppression''
of Infants -- --12 1 --2 --1 --1
Bankruptcy Offences . . . . . . . . . I 1 --1 1'3 5 --6
Offences against Religion and Ministers
of Religion -- 1 --1 -- --7 . 07
Duelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- . 04 . 03 -- -- --
Abortion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- -- -- og -- --OI
Offences against the Game Laws -- -- -- -- 13 12-7
Drunkenness -- -- -- -- 1 5 1 5
Offences against Public Decency -- -- -- -- I-8 1. 7
Adultery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -- -- -- --5 5
Offences against Morality, with Incitement
to Immorality . . . .
