Little Criminals: The Story of a New Zealand Boys' Home

In this review of Little Criminals: The Story of a New Zealand Boys' Home, David Cohen offers a clear-eyed, journalistic reckoning with decades of state-run residences for children. This book is for readers who want a well-documented social history and an empathetic probe into institutional care; its biggest reason to buy is Cohen's combination of personal experience and reporting that connects individual testimony to wider policy failure. The narrative reads like investigative social history rather than memoir, and the author frames his findings with a persistent concern for accountability and reform.

Key Features

• Firsthand perspective: Cohen writes from personal experience at Epuni Boy's Home, which grounds the book's reporting in lived reality and lends credibility to interviews with former residents and staff.
• Historical scope: The book traces New Zealand's residences from the late 1950s through the mid 1980s, providing a long view of how policy and practice evolved over three decades.
• Investigative reporting: The author tracks down multiple former residents and staff members, assembling testimony that reveals systemic patterns rather than isolated incidents.
• Critical analysis: Cohen questions whether overcrowded homes and undertrained staff could produce positive outcomes, pushing readers to consider structural causes.
• Social context: The book situates individual stories within social and economic pressures, such as large families and poverty, that led to children being placed in homes.

Who It's For

This book is suited to readers interested in social sciences, criminology, child welfare policy, and New Zealand history who want a candid, evidence-based account rather than a sanitized institutional history. Researchers, students, and advocates will find the interviews and personal testimony useful for understanding patterns of care and harm.

Readers looking for a light memoir or a prescriptive policy manual should look elsewhere; this is not a how-to guide for reform but an investigative narrative that highlights problems and lived consequences. Those seeking global comparative studies may also need to supplement this with broader data sets.

Pros & Cons

Pros

• Powerful firsthand testimony that illuminates daily life inside boys' homes and the long-term impacts on residents.
• Careful reporting that combines personal memory with interviews to reveal systemic issues in institutions.
• Useful historical framing that documents changes in policy and practice across three decades.

Cons

• The book focuses tightly on New Zealand cases and personal accounts, so readers wanting large-scale comparative statistics may find the scope limited.

Specifications

Title	Little Criminals: The Story of a New Zealand Boys' Home
Author	David Cohen
Subject	History and social analysis of state-run children's residences
Geographic focus	New Zealand
Time period covered	Late 1950s to mid 1980s
Principal case study	Epuni Boy's Home

Our Verdict

Little Criminals is a persuasive and humane piece of investigative social history that will reward readers who want an in-depth look at institutional care in New Zealand. Its blend of personal experience and reporting makes it valuable to advocates and scholars, and it offers strong value for anyone seeking to understand how policy, poverty, and under-resourced institutions intersected to shape children's lives.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the author have personal experience in these homes?
Yes. David Cohen spent time at Epuni Boy's Home in the 1970s and uses that experience alongside interviews to inform his reporting.

What period does the book cover?
The narrative follows residences from the late 1950s through the mid 1980s, when many such homes were closed.

Is the book suitable for academic research?
Yes. The combination of firsthand testimony and tracked-down interviews makes it useful for researchers studying child welfare and institutional history.