PHRENOLOGY NEW WRINKLE
IN DETECTING CRIMINALS.
Latest Study in Criminology More
or Less Success as Practiced by Stone.
Probably the wisest policeman on the force is an officer who has only lately been given command of a station. This particular officer boasts of some ability as a phrenologist, and the poor man unlucky enough to be arrested in his district has to risk the result of an examination of the bumps on his head. The system is a brand new one in metropolitan police circles and has caused a great deal of argument as to its practical results.
Lieutenant DeWitt C. Stone, commanding No. 4 district, is the officer who is said to be an expert phrenologist. When persons are arrested and sent to the station it is said that the lieutenant lines them up in a row against the wall. After studying the frontal appearance of the prisoners, he orders them to turn and face the wall. Then the examination of bumps, ridges and contours of the skull is put into play.
Carefully feeling the shapely craniums of the men, the officer figures out the particular branch of crime in which each person is engaged. Maybe the first prisoner will have a low ridge across the fore part of the skull and if so he is booked on the blotter as a vagrant. Two small round protuberances back of either ear marks a man as a yeggman and his name is so catalogued on the blotter.
But if a ridge, a flat knoll or a depression should be found the man is of a more desperate character and the lieutenant has him booked for investigation. Those who are familiar with the district say that the system has a good effect as the habitues of No. 4 station are afraid the lieutenant might make a mistake and charge them with a more serious crime than they are guilty of.
