ABSTRACT
English Criminal Statistics are based mainly upon two fundamental aspects, being partly statistics of persons who have committed crimes and partly statistics of crimes committed. First of all should be borne in mind the fundamental difference that separates statistics of “Crimes Known to the Police” from other types of Criminal Statistics. The latter—whether they may be statistics of “Persons Tried or Convicted,” or of “Length of Sentences,” or of “Receptions in Institutions”—represent but mechanical transferences from one ledger into another, and the person who copies them has in no way to examine whether or not the conviction or the sentence, may be justified. “In 1890,” states the Report on Criminal Statistics of 1895, there were in Liverpool 132 ‘known thieves’ under the age of 16, in Birmingham only 23, in Bradford none, and in Manchester none.
