Cesare Lombroso, an Italian physician and criminologist, is widely considered the "father of criminology" for his pioneering work in studying crime and criminals scientifically, particularly his theories on the "born criminal". was the founder of the Italian school of positivist criminology, which argued that a criminal mind was inherited and could be identified by physical features and defects. Lombroso, while not aware of Gregor Johann Mendel's work on heredity, was inspired by Franz Joseph Ga