YOUTHFUL CRIMINALS by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 25, 1903

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 29, No. 47.

YOUTHFUL CRIMINALS.

By Editor

WE are being continually confronted with a condition of our times which must cause astonishment and sorrow to those who will stop long enough to give it even a passing thought, and that is the increase in criminality among the young. We find adepts in the ways of wickedness among those who are hardly out of their mothers' laps, and are being continually surprised by the precociousness of the youth of our day, especially in those things that have a downward trend. Youthful murderers, youthful torturers of playmates, youthful foot-pads and pickpockets and burglars, youthful forgers, youthful elopers and participants in vice, all are increasing as if being graduated from an institution that was working overtime to accomplish its ends. The following is but a sample of a great mass:—

In San Diego, Cal. (as in other cities), opium joints abound, and many young children have been found in them, smoking the drug. They are arrested when so found, and either fined or sent to jail, where with other criminals they soon learn other evil practices. A number of boys recently attempted to hold up and rob an Oregon train, and one of them has just been sentenced to ten years in the penitentiary. In Neligh, Neb., on October 5, a five-year-old boy was killed by his playmates, who were “having fun” with him. A boy of sixteen, living at Santa Rosa, Cal., has been found guilty of attempting to wreck a train. He had previously tied a dog on the track to see it killed. A number of boys in Oakland, Cal., have been found guilty of holding up and robbing other boys. They had formed themselves into a band, and tortured their victims when no articles of value were found on them. A boy of eighteen has confessed to having set fire to one of the buildings of the Whittier Reform School. Two youth of Portland, Ore., tortured two small boys by holding their faces over burning powder. The faces and arms of the boys were terribly burned. Two boys of eighteen and nineteen were hanged at Lexington, Ky., for murder. A girl of Los Angeles, Cal., eleven years old, confessed to poisoning the family with which she was living “to see how people act when they take poison.” A girl of seventeen, living at Bloomington, Ill., murdered her two-year-old sister, because she had a special interest in the removal of the baby. There have been a large number of suicides during the year of young men and women from sixteen to twenty years of age. A boy of fifteen attempted to wreck a train in Salt Lake. Two girls aged eleven and nine, with a boy of seven, attempted to wreck a train at the Merced River, in California. A girl of eleven, in Oakland, Cal., is found to be a confirmed kleptomaniac. A boy of nineteen passed two forged checks in New York, on October 15, amounting to $10,076, and eloped with a schoolgirl. They were arrested in British Columbia. A young man of Chicago was arrested recently for the murder of his mother, father, and another man, the theory being that he intended to secure the $6,000 insurance which his father carried. He claimed that his father killed the other two and then committed suicide. Two sisters and two brothers, ranging in age from seven to eleven, were found guilty of housebreaking and burglary in Newark, N. J., early in October. A San Francisco boy of fourteen recently robbed his employer of $135, and locked him in his room. He was captured later. There have recently been a number of cases where boys have shot their fathers during the progress of domestic quarrels, and of boys who have shot young women who had refused to marry them. In some of these latter cases the murderers have taken their own lives.

The above is but a small portion of the crimes of children recorded during the past few months. We have heretofore given figures showing a rapid increase of child criminals in France. We do not have statistics for other countries, but it is safe to assert that the conditions are similar throughout. They indicate anything but a hopeful situation.