Robbery With Murder in Dános – An Important Source for Research

Abstract

The article highlights the importance of source analysis and source criticism in connection with the scientific research of a real criminal case. After his release from life imprisonment in 1937, “wandering gipsy” Lakatos Balog János (Sztojka Párnó), the primary accused of the robbery with murder committed in 1907 in Dános, met a police officer and they talked about the crime. The police officer chronicled this conversation in a later record, and the author – who discovered the record himself – compared it with interviews made with the convict by the contemporary press. The comparison of the source texts seemingly differing in important details resulted in objective data about the most important person in the case.