Читать книгу The New York Tombs Inside and Out!. Scenes and Reminiscences Coming Down to the Present. A Story Stranger Than Fiction, with an Historic Account of America's Most Famous Prison онлайн

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The fair sex are sometimes at fault in this respect and indirectly responsible for certain kinds of crime. When they go shopping they carry in their hands wallets or pocket-books containing small amounts of money. In former years they carried their money in their dress pockets. By exposing their pocket-books they tempt the moral defective to commit crime. Men and women also tempt the instinctive criminal, when they carry, exposed to public gaze, watches and jewelry on the person. It is true that this is our right. But we must not tempt men. I believe that the crimes of pocket-book snatching and larcenies from the person would be few and far between if people carried their valuables concealed from public view.

Frequently we meet people who possess a morbid propensity to commit crime. On some things they are perfectly rational, on others they are incapable of acting correctly. You can safely say, they are mildly insane!

Here is a lady on the street with a chatelaine bag dangling around her waist. The thief presumes that it contains money and other valuables. The owner is unconsciously tempting a poor weakling. From our standpoint this is a dangerous expedient. By and by there comes along a poor, hungry, homeless, penniless creature. He possesses criminal instincts. He sees the pocket-book in the lady’s possession. It is a well known fact that the sight of money awakens the worst passions of men. An evil impulse takes possession of him. He seizes the money and runs away. This is not an exceptional case. The criminal annals of New York can furnish hundreds of such cases, where men were seized with an impulse to commit a crime that sent them to prison for many years.