Sexual Murder - Justicia Forense

— the homicide would not have occurred. The presence of such a compulsioncan be detected by the excessive amount of force used in committing a crime,force that is out of proportion to what would seem necessary. The use ofexcessive force reveals a deeper dynamic fueling the extreme aggression. Thesubject in the following case entertained undifferentiated violent fantasiesfor years that were released only during the commission of a robbery.Case 9.3: Compulsion Released During RobberyA 25-year-old male (CC), along with an associate, brutally murdered a storekeeperduring a robbery in which a small amount of money was taken from thecash register. They beat the victim to death with a club and hit him in the facewith a bottle — both objects found in the store.CC was the youngest of nine siblings who lived in severe poverty. All hisbrothers had some criminal involvement, including vandalism and aggression.His father was an abusive alcoholic who abandoned the family after serving ashort jail term for nonsupport. As an adolescent, CC committed acts of violencethat necessitated multiple appearances in juvenile court. A school reportdescribed him as “an antisocial troublemaker without close friends.” He skippedschool frequently and sometimes just walked out of class. On one occasion hepulled out a knife and was sent home. CC stole from stores, businesses, andother adolescents, and was involved in bullying behavior as well. For severalyears, he set fires, sometimes to relieve anger and at other times because he felteuphoric when he watched the flames.CC looked dejected and much older than his age. He passively cooperated inthe evaluation but lacked emotion and seemed indifferent. He did not appear tobe upset about his legal situation or the outcome of his trial. He seemed interestedonly when he told the examiner stories of violence and distrust of people, andwhen he described his bizarre fantasies. He was proud of pulling a knife on ateacher at age 9 or 10, and he seemed preoccupied with knives and guns.The evaluator easily elicited intense fantasies of murder and torture. “In afight I try to kill the guy. I always want to kill.” He found it relaxing to fantasizeabout murdering people, burning their eyes out, cutting out their tongues, andcutting the tendons of their arms and legs so that they would be helpless. Hedistrusted people and felt others were sneaky. CC hoped to be executed, stating,“I will come back in this form and prove that God is wrong.”The extent of CC’s aggressive fantasies (with pronounced sadistic content,including preoccupation with weapons and repetitive fire setting) indicates thatthe murder was not incidental but rather an outgrowth of an underlying compulsionthat would be expressed only under the right circumstances. In this case,the compulsion was masked by the robbery. Social isolation, preoccupation withbizarre and aggressive fantasies, flat affect, friendlessness, and the perception ofhim by others as being eccentric and strange mark CC as having a schizotypalpersonality disorder.