Matt DeLisi - Psychopathy as Unified Theory of Crime

Series Editors

Matt DeLisi

Psychopathy as Unified Theory of Crime

Matt DeLisi

ISBN 978-1-137-46909-0 e-ISBN 978-1-137-46907-6

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-46907-6

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016951216

The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016

Palgraves Frontiers in Criminology Theory

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Acknowledgments

Contents

The Author(s) 2016

Matt DeLisi 1

(1)

Several professional experiences served as sources of motivation to write a book that presented psychopathy as a unified theory of crime. The first relates to the current authors clinical experiences as an expert witness and consultant on various criminal cases involving offenders who perpetrated multiple homicides. Almost without exception, despite variation in age, race, ethnicity, and geographic region in which they lived, these defendants were effectively the same person in terms of their life history. To move retrospectively, they perpetrated multiple homicides either over an extended period of time or in a single flashpoint of violence. These homicides were the crescendo of a long, expansive antisocial career that involved multiple periods of confinement in prisons, jails, and, before that, commitment facilities and detention centers. Their criminal career displaced any genuine involvement in a legitimate career in terms of viable employment or educational achievement. Indeed, the degree to which they were engaged in illegal activities as evidenced by their criminal record was so staggering that it almost seemed mythical. The commitment to antisocial behavior documented by one arrest after another followed by an additional form of punishment after another was nothing less than absurd. It was the same story when reviewing materials on their behaviors during adolescence and during childhood. What was potentially difficult to predict at the time became abundantly clear in retrospect: Juvenile delinquent, thug, problem child, angry child, disturbed child, child in need of assistance, and other indicators of behavioral dysfunction were the signals that the individual was sharply different from others in terms of their emotional and behavioral functioning. They were sharply different.