And the MJ article spends half the time talking about how economically worthwhile lead abatement measures would be, without bothering to report that lead abatement is already well subsidized and promoted, because policymakers at both the state and federal level are aware of the high long-term costs of childhood lead poisoning; google 'lead abatement site:gov' for an abundance of resources. Those bureaucrats and politicians aren't advising people to clean up lead-based paint and offering grants just to pass the time, they're doing it because they already know about the high social costs of lead contamination. That's also why unleaded gasoline is now the norm.
A single reference by a criminologist in a journal of another field does NOT prove that criminologists take this seriously. Given the author claims to have contacted several experts in that field with none giving the lead theory any credence, you'd need a bit more evidence to show they do.