Medicine: Criminal Glands

That every murderer, potential and actual, exhibits over-secretion of the thyroid gland; that every forger exhibits under-secretion of the pituitary gland; that every social misfit displays malsecretion of some gland.

The specificity of these conclusions, made by Dr. Ralph Arthur Reynolds, 38, of San Francisco last week, intrigued doctors and criminologists. Where did he get his data? At California’s San Quentin prison where he and Dr. Leo Leonidas Stanley, 43, prison physician, discovered that every one of the inmates had some abnormal glandular stigma. Three score they treated by surgery or with glandular extracts. All responded with “surprisingly beneficial” results, suggesting therefore a way of reforming criminals.