If a thief is killed and his friends and accomplices secure possession of the body, which they invariably try to do, the skin is cut from the face of the corpse, and all clothing removed from the body. These precautions are taken for the purpose of preventing identification.
It was once a common custom, and still prevails to some extent in the rural provinces, to liquidate the crime of a wound or even murder by cash payment. It is claimed that the law is slow of execution, expensive and unsatisfactory, giving nothing to the victim or his family. If a poor man is killed, the assassin or his representatives will settle the affair for a few dollars, sometimes not more than five or ten dollars. If a man of means and social standing in the community meets a violent death, the price is from twenty-five to fifty pesos. These liquidations in former times were not private. Public interest was often aroused and the neighbors entered into the negotiations to see that a fair price was paid. If a person was stabbed a few times it was not considered of sufficient importance to require a money payment; a few drinks canceled the account for damages.
So notorious has become the commission of crime, in recent years, that El Mercurio, the most widely circulated and influential paper in the country devoted much space to the subject a few years ago. The following is an extract and translation from an article appearing in that journal in February, 1903:
“The alarm produced in all classes of society due to the extraordinary development which is taking place in the criminality in Chile, especially in the capital, has induced us to open an investigation as to the causes of such a deplorable social condition. A study of the causes which have tended to foster such a great increase in the number of criminal acts is undoubtedly due to the complete disorganization of public affairs in this country, and should serve to call seriously the attention of the government to the imperious necessity of attempting some course of action which would tend to remedy in part, at least, the disastrous condition of the nation at large. The enormous development of criminality in this country is not only the manifestation of a very grave social condition, nor is it only the symptom of a social dissolution in its worst form, but it is the visible cause of the discredit which our country is suffering among foreign nations.
“The European press avails itself of all data relative to the number of terrible crimes committed in Chile, and also of their sanguinary and atrocious character, and denounces them to their fellow citizens as proof of the insecurity of life and property in this country.”
El Mercurio, in its endeavor to ascertain the reason for the extraordinary criminal condition of the country, interviewed Mr. Luis Urzua Gana, public prosecutor for the department of Santiago, who made the following statement:
“I believe that the first and foremost cause of the existing criminal condition is due to the fact that a large proportion of the crimes remain unpunished. I believe that eighty per cent. of the offenses committed are not punished, and that a large proportion of them are not even denounced. As the greater the probability that a crime will not be punished, so law and justice lose their deterrent effect.
“Another cause of criminality is the large number of vagrant children, either in complete idleness or in some kind of work which enables them to gain in a few hours enough money for their food and vices. Boys of twelve years of age and even under, exhibit in this country, the same moral monstrosities as do men old in sin and crime. Among them, gambling has reached a surprising development, and there seems to be no form of immorality which has not its adepts among them. And worse still there are people who foster their vicious practices and make a business out of their degradation.”
Soon after his election in 1901 President Riesco secured the passage of a bill in the national congress providing for the establishment and maintenance of a specially selected and well equipped cavalry regiment, to be used in suppressing lawlessness. This troop is subject to service in any part of the Republic where the protection of life and property is required. The usefulness and effectiveness of this kind of service is due to the fact that a better class of men is selected, than is found in the municipal and provincial police. It is too small in numbers, however, to properly guard and protect any considerable portion of the mountainous country constituting the territory of Chile.