The Criminal Mind

There has been a lot of talk at my school lately about people hanging around the law school & library that "don't belong there." It sparks a lot of debate because it is a public school, and therefore a public building. But those of us in the law school practically live there, and we are protective of the area . Particularly upsetting to my peers is that things have been "stolen" and many of them blame the local homeless drifters. They figure, if crimes are being committed it is by them, not their fellow law students. Regardless of who is actually stealing, removing the drifters likely would end most of the crime, either by eliminating the perpetrators or the convenient scapegoats.

The truth is that most crimes are preventible, often by the victim. If you don't want your stuff stolen from the library, don't walk away from it. It's pretty simple. We all have lockers that we can lock our stuff in, and while that isn't foolproof, it would likely eliminate a good deal of the property crime we see. Few criminals go to much trouble to commit crimes, they don't want to be noticed so they move swiftly, quietly, and discretely. So, few will go thru the trouble of breaking a lock, especially when they have no clue what the payout will be.

Even in more serious crimes, there is what criminologists might call victim facilitation or participation. It's not a blame the victim theory, it simply points out that we each have more control over our victimization than we think. Ted Bundy, John Wayne Gacy, and Jeffrey Dahmer all convinced their victims to go with them willingly, and with very little effort. Certainly none of those people deserved to die, but the truth is that almost all of them could have saved themselves. In fact, when we act with a reasonable amount of suspicion in our daily lives, there is no telling how many times we avoid assaults, rapes, or even murders, simply by becoming unattractive victims.

The theory is that you want to live your life so that you can never reasonably say "If only I had/hadn't done that, this crime would not have happened." Some crimes are practically unavoidable. For example, when someone is after you personally. Most violent crimes are committed by "intimates." The number one cause of death for pregnant women is murder, usually by a husband or lover. Those are practically unavoidable. Sure you could say if the victim had never talked to the perpetrator in the first place, never fallen in love, never had sex, or used birth control. But those things are too removed in time. Crimes by intimates don't occur because you didn't get your keys out before you walked to your car, they occur because the perp wanted to get you, and they would have eventually no matter what you did.

But things like muggings, robberies, burglaries, those criminal are rarely going after the person, they are going after the stuff. They will still aim for people they are familiar with or that share similar characteristics with them, because it makes them more comfortable and success more likely, but mostly they are looking for vulnerability and a good take.This is when observing your surroundings and not talking to strangers actually can protect you. If a criminal has a choice between robbing someone who will walk quietly away with them (whether by force or mental coercion) and someone who will scream and fight back, they will virtually always choose the 1st option.

However, some criminals don't mind a fuss, because they know they will get away with it anyway. Among them is my "favorite" serial killer: Andrei Chikatillo. Andrei was Russian and he attacked many of his victims in a "blitz" manner, jumping out of bushes and pouncing in some cases. His murders were animalistic, biting, ripping, and tearing at flesh; even cannibalizing some organs. But Andrei was safe from the cops because this was during the communist regime in Russia. The government refused to acknowledge that these murders were happening, for fear that people would blame communism. They wanted the world to think communism was crime free. This is impossible. Human civilization is the only both necessary & sufficient cause of crime. No economic or political philosophy can change that. So, Andrei took over 100 victims before the citizens were warned. Eventually, he was caught and had to be kept in a cage during his trial. The Russians executed him shortly afterwards, and tried quickly to put him out of their minds.

In a way it's a shame that society is so quick to dispose of these type of violent, sadistic criminals, because it gives us minimal time to study them. Sociopathy is an extremely intriguing condition. Today, some beleive (including myself) that sociopathy can appear in children, even though the DSM doesn't allow such a diagnosis to be made. We also believe that there are degrees of sociopathy, often present in fully functioning human beings, just small traces and hints of lacking empathy and selfish desires that amount to a muted form of the disorder. There is a lot to be learned about these theories, and the more subjects we have to study forever. Ted Bundy was a classic sociopath, and the little bit of information we have about him is not nearly as much as I would like to see. Nevermind the fact that simply allowing him to live and have his disease play itself out overtime may help us to determine if sociopathic children could be rehabilitated or not.

But, I could go on about my serial killers all day, they are my most prolific muse. But, I am hungry and tired from a long day, so more will have to come later.