In an effort to learn who are offenders against the law and if possible to find a clue to the reason why first offenders become oldtimers in the criminal courts, the Detroit Community Union and the Detroit Bureau of Governmental Research are making a study of the police and court records, together with a survey of the system as a whole, namely, the courts, the jail, and the house of correction, each of which in its turn handles and disposes of the offender, which handling and disposition affects his future conduct. In making this study the information contained on approximately 250,000 arrest cards representing the arrests made in Detroit during the seven years ending December 31, 1919, was transferred to cards permitting of tabulation by the Hollerith tabulating machines. Tabulations are now being made to show for each crime the age, nationality, sex, color, literacy, and social condition of the persons arrested, together with the dispositions of each arrest and the judge making the disposition. Furthermore, there is being extracted from the arrest cards at police headquarters the police history and the personal history, in so far as the arrest cards contain them, of all persons arrested more than once during these seven years. As it is rather difficult to identify repeaters from the information contained on the arrest cards, only those cases are recorded in which identification can be made with
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Apr 1, 1960
Arch Mandel 
Open Access