A comparative study of the New Zealand habitual offender

Abstract

The habitual offender has long been regarded as belonging to a separate group within the criminal population. Modern classification and the rise of scientific criminology have supported the traditional legal and theoretical differentiation of this group, and there are very few modern, legal systems which do not treat the habitual criminal as one requiring either additional or special sanctions. Similarly, criminologists have always realised that however successful the measures advocated for the majority of criminals may prove, there will always be a group with whom all these measures will fail. The terms 'habitual', 'persistent', or 'chronic' (all of which are assumed to be equivalent in meaning for the purposes of this study), are frequently applied to this group of offenders.