Can crime and criminals be curbed by computer?
That was the title of the final chapter in the memoir of Frank Bunn. Titled No Silver Spoon, as that title suggests it was the story of how Bunn, born in Great Yarmouth in 1892, rose from teenage soldier and railway police recruit to pre-1914 Norfolk Police constable, serving in King’s Lynn. St Helens, and Bacup, before becoming chief constable of Gravesend, Grimsby and lastly Stoke-on-Trent, where he retired in 1955.
As a man who began policing before his rural constabulary even had a motor vehicle, you can imagine he came late to computers when he published his autobiography in 1970. Yet at once he has something useful to tell us about use of computers or not to prevent and deter crime, while being quaintly in the dark about what effect computers would have on policing and all of us. He wrote:
“It would be most encouraging and refreshing to law-abiding citizens if the installation of a Computer – no matter how costly – would or could possibly result in a curb on crime and professional criminals.
“At first sight, the Computer, known to be of great utility in certain circumstances, gives hope that great expectations could materialise from its use; but upon giving thought and consideration to the machine and its capabilities, some doubts are bound to appear to those people who are aware of its requirements before it could act as an ‘Informer’ upon which reliance could be placed. They know that it must first be fed, and will wonder what it must be ‘told’, to be of use to the Police Service as an offensive and legal weapon in preventing, detecting and investigating crimes …
“Many Police Officers, ex-police Officers and others – including professional criminals, will be wondering who will be held responsible for ‘feeding the beast’ and keeping it up to date.
“On television, on the night we were told that the computer was on its way to London, and that it wouldn’t be long before it would be helping the ‘man on the beat’ to catch the motor-car thief and criminals in such vehicles, we, the public felt that routine had changed; for quite recently we were told from the same source, that the number of motor vehicles stolen in London each day had reached such proportions, that it had been decided by Scotland Yard that the registration particulars would not be passed to men on the beat.
“The gentleman giving the news of the coming of the computer said, in answering a question, that if a Constable had cause to think that a certain motor-car had been stolen, all he had to do was ring up to where the computer was kept, and he would be told. How marvellous! How simple! The man at the computer, be he Civil Servant or Police Officer – would have to be an angel to refrain from saying rude words to each of the hundreds of disturbers of his peace.
…. “Personally, I think somebody has been pulling somebody’s leg. Only Theorists who have never been real and practical Police Officers or who have never had actual experience in making inquiries …; or those who have never been called to give evidence … would imagine that a computer could possibly be of use in the much desired reduction, prevention and detection of crime, of bringing criminals to justice.”
[It plainly never had occurred to Bunn or anyone yet that criminals might own and use the then large and expensive computers; but Bunn had grasped a basic rule of computing – GIGO – garbage in, garbage out.]
