Who was first criminologists to attempt to formally classify criminals for statistical comparison?

Answer 1

Cesare Lombroso (1835-1909) is recognized as one of the first criminologists to formally classify criminals for statistical comparison. In his published work, The Criminal Man (1876), Lombroso compared similarities of like offenders, such as race, age, gender, physical characteristics, education, and geographic region. Lombroso deduced that the motivations of criminal behavior could be better understood, and even predicted, by profiling the criminal (Turvey, p. 19). Lombroso's study consisted of 383 Italian prisoners. Through his research, he concluded there were three major types of criminal. The first he described were born criminals. These individuals could be identified by their physical characteristics. Lombroso described 18 physical characteristics indicative of a born criminal in his theory of anthropology, ranging from the physical characteristics of the facial structure to excessively long limbs. As the name suggests, they were, in Lombroso's opinion, predestined for criminal activity. The next, insane criminals, were offenders who suffered from a mental deficiency of physical ailment that caused them to commit crime. The final type Lombroso described was the criminaloid.Criminaloids were a large class of offenders without specific characteristics. They did not display the physical or mental deficiencies of the other two categories, but their mental state predisposed them to commit criminal behavior under extenuating circumstances. This classification of offender has been compared to psychopathic personality disorder (Turvey, 2012, p. 19).

Other body-type theorists have attempted to follow in the footsteps of Lombroso in an effort to classify criminals and potential criminals based on biological and environmental factors. In 1914, Gerald Fosbroke published his first work, Character Reading through Analysis of the Features (1938).Fosbroke argued that it is not biological factors and nature that shape the facial structure of an individual, but an individual's own maturation. Fosbroke believed that what kind of person one is would be reflected in the characteristics of their physical structures (Turvey, 2012, p. 20).

The era of criminal profiling was also impacted by a German criminologist named Dr. Erich Wulffen, who served as the ministerial director and head of the Department of Crime-Pardon and Parole-and of the Administration of Prisons of the Ministry of Justice of Saxony. Wulffen published a text called Woman as a Sexual Criminal(1935). Dr. Wulffen's work researched social, psychological, biological, and moral causes of crime involving the female criminal. Throughout the text, Dr. Wulffen maintains that most crime committed by women is related to sexuality and sexual abnormalities (Turvey, 2012, p. 21-22).

Another German criminologist, Ernst Kretschmer, evolved Lombroso's original theories of physical characteristic into a more predictive arena. Kretschmer believed that the type of crime and individual was subject to commit could be predicted by observing physical characteristics. However, Kretschmer never submitted any of his research for peer review, therefore his work is unfounded (Turvey, 2012, p. 21).

The works of these individuals, especially Lombroso, is yet to be abandon by the currently scientific community of forensics neurology, psychiatry, and psychiatry. Oftentimes, these early findings are still used as a last-ditch effort to gain insight into the criminal mind and understand why an individual is driven to commit crime.

Reference:

Turvey, B. E. (2012). Criminal Profiling: An Introduction to Behavioral Evidence Analysis (4th Edition). Burlington, MA: Academic Press.

Answer 2

Cesare Lombroso is often credited as one of the first criminologists to attempt to classify criminals for statistical comparison. He believed in the theory of "born criminal" and developed a classification system based on physical characteristics and behaviors.