The Trouble with Crime

In Educator Helen Parkhurst's Manhattan apartment, a group of reformed bad boys met last week to talk about how & why kids go wrong. Their recorded words were heard on ABC's Child's World (Thurs. 10 p.m., E.S.T.). As is often the case with confessions, the sins were more interesting than the good resolutions.

Chick, who had progressed from stealing milk bottles to shoplifting, told why it was difficult to stop: "When you're used to having money in your pocket, you'll always want it. When your pocket's empty, it's got to be full. It's sort of like an automobile--can't run without gasoline." Frank explained what happened to $500 he'd stolen: "I gave $10 to my mother and told her I won it in a dice game. And I gave $10 to my brother . . . And the rest, I--I went out and threw the money away, because I knew I couldn't bring nothing home ... My mother would have wanted to know where I got the money . . ."

No more stealing in future? Most of the boys said vaguely that they needed someone they could "depend on." Said resourceful Chick: "A friend of mine is in the Golden Gloves, that's a boxing club, and he fought four rounds and won a beautiful $150 Bulova watch ... If he can do it, I can do it. So I'm gonna enlist in the Golden Gloves, and I'm gonna fight."

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