He studied at the universities of Greifswald, Jena und Leipzig a palette of subjects covering Theology, Philosophy, Medicine and Jurisprudence.
[1] In 1922 he was working as a probationary judge ("Gerichtsassessor") before accepting an invitation to transfer to the University of Cologne in 1923 where he was given a professorship and directorship of the new Institute for Criminal Sciences.
[1] His early published work covered criminal justice in the Italian city states during the later medieval period.
[3] He was elected president of the Madrid based "Centre international d'études sur la fausse monnaie", also becoming vice-president of the Cologne-based German Photography Society.
[1] The focus of his work continued to be on criminalistics and criminology, taking an increasingly inter-disciplinary approach that combined ideas from jurisprudence, philosophy, psychology, historiography, sociology and natural sciences.