Crimes In Germany Show 500 Per Cent Increase, The American (Article, December 1921)
Full Text
CRIMES IN GERMANY SHOW 500 [PERCENT] INCREASE
Beer Apparently Not a Cure For Crime
Long and loudly have the wets asserted that beer is the solution of the crime problem. Increased crime in some sections of this country has been attributed to Prohibition by the beer and wine advocates. Surely there is plenty of beer in Germany. According to the wet argument crime there should be practically unknown. But read this copyright article from the Chicago Tribune of December 15th:
"Berlin, Dec. 13.--There has been a 500 [percent] increase in crime in Germany since the war. There have been 2,000,000 cases of degeneracy reported, a number equal to 3 [percent] of the population. In Berlin there have been 110 murders in ten months."
These sensational figures from police reports and experts' statements illustrate the remarkable crime wave surging over the country, coming at a time when reports of hypnotic murders, [Landru?] cases, and even the chopping of human being into sausage meat are filling the press.
Record in Europe
Numerous American visitors to Berlin, who complain of being approached by degenerates on Unter den Linden at the corner of Friederichstrasse, are not surprised to learn that as a result of the war the percentage of degenerates in Berlin exceeds all the rest of Germany and probably all the capitals of Europe.
According to the greatest expert on persons of this kind, Dr. Hirschfeld, who treated 21,000 cases personally before the war, there were probably 400,000 in Germany. Blaming the war, and especially imprisonments and internments, Dr. Hirschfeld states that the number is now 2,000,000.
Ten Murders a Month
The police announce that, in addition to ten murders monthly in Berlin, there have been 2,500 burglaries this year, 10,000 thefts, 835 suicides, 145 plundering raids, 2,0000 violations of morals laws, and 330 illegal demonstrations.
Thieves have stolen $1,000,000 worth of property from Berlin hotels this year.
