─────────────────┬─────────┬─────────┬────────────────┬──────────────── Nature of crimes │ Total │Mentally │ Percentages of │ Percentages of │criminals│defective│ mental │ general │ │ │defectives among│ population │ │ │those committing│ committing the │ │ │ various crimes │several offenses ─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┼────────────────┼──────────────── Malicious damage │ 55│ 22│ 40.00│ 0.406 to property │ │ │ │ Stealing and │ 442│ 45│ 10.18│ 4.180 burglary │ │ │ │ Sexual offences │ 101│ 13│ 12.87│ 0.199 Violence to the │ 183│ 11│ 6.01│ 1.606 person │ │ │ │ Forgery, coining │ 167│ 4│ 2.40│ 0.722 and fraud │ │ │ │ ─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┼────────────────┼──────────────── Total │ 948│ 95│ 10.00│ 7.203 ─────────────────┴─────────┴─────────┴────────────────┴──────────────── Some very striking instances of recidivism on the part of the feeble-minded were summarized by Dr. Smalley in his evidence before the Royal Commission (_83_). He said: “Against 130 out of 333 weak-minded prisoners who were unfit for ordinary penal discipline by reason of mental deficiency, no previous conviction had been recorded; but for this absence of record their nomadic habits might in part account. Against fifty-six 1 conviction had been recorded, against twenty-eight 2; the remainder varied from 4 to 105 convictions. About half had been convicted from 5 to 10 times.... Dr. Hamblin Smith, Medical Officer of Stafford Prison, as the result of a special inquiry into 100 mentally defective prisoners, found that 100 had a combined record of 1,104 convictions, or an average of 11 per prisoner, and this number was regarded as being below the actual truth. Ten of the prisoners had over 30 convictions. Dr. W. R. Dawson found that in the two prisons in Dublin 12.21 per cent. of the inmates were defectives. The average number of previous convictions for the females was 44.13. Many of them ran into hundreds, and one was in prison for the two-hundred and thirty-sixth time, and she was only twenty-nine years old.”