Evil or Insane? The Female Serial Killer and Her Doubly Deviant Femininity(9) Helen Gavin

 


Evil or Insane? The Female Serial Killer and Her Doubly Deviant Femininity(9)

Helen Gavin


8.   Angels of Death (9)

Nurses feature prominently in serial killing, the caregiver who intentionally harms or kills the people in her care. This is murder from a position of power; the ‘angel’ often claims that victims were suffering and ending life is an act of mercy. Neutralization theory suggests the killers understand what they are doing is wrong but that the helping behaviour neutralises the wrong doing. [i] The alternative explanation is an issue of mental health. In 1991, Beverley Allit killed four children and attempted to kill at least a further three in the Grantham and Kesteven Hospital, Lincolnshire, where she was a nurse. She administered large doses of insulin or injected air into her victims. She received several life sentences and is detained in a secure psychiatric hospital. She is in hospital, not prison, as she has been identified as being mentally ill with a factitious disorder, known as Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a somewhat controversial diagnosis.


[i] Graham Sykes and David Matza, ‘Techniques of Neutralization: A Theory of Delinquency,’

 To insert individual citation into a bibliography in a word-processor, select your preferred citation style below and drag-and-drop it into the document. American Sociological Review 22.6 (1957): 664-670. 667

 

Bibliography

 

Buhk, Tobin T. and Stephen D. Cohle. Skeletons in the Closet. New York: Prometheus Books, 2008.

 

Caputi, J. ‘The Sexual Politics of Murder.’ Gender & Society 3(1989):437-456.

 

Dietz, P. E., R. R. Hazelwood, and Warren, J. ‘The sexual sadistic criminal and his offenses.’ Bulletin of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law 18 (1990): 163-178.

 

Dworkin, Andrea. ‘Pornography: The New Terrorism.’ NYU Rev. L. & Soc. Change 8 (1978): 215.

 

FBI Records: The Vault Bonnie and Clyde. [http://vault.fbi.gov retrieved 2.2.13]

 

Fox, James Alan, and Jack Levin. Overkill: Mass Murder and Serial Killing Exposed. New York: Plenum Press, 1994.

Frei, Andreas, Birgit Völlm, Marc Graf, and Volker Dittman. ‘Female serial killing: review and case report.’ Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health 16.3 (September 2006): 167–176.

 

Gavin, Helen. ‘The damsel in distress: not as sweet as she is painted?’ 4th Global Conference on Evil, Women and the Feminine, Prague, Czech Republic, May 2012.

 

______. ‘‘Mummy wouldn't do that’ The Perception and Construction of the Female Sex offender.’ Grotesque Femininities: Evil, Women and the Feminine, edited by Maria Barrett,61-78 Oxford: ID-Net Press, 2010.

 

Kirschner, David. ‘The Adopted Child Syndrome: Considerations for Psychotherapy.’ Psychotherapy in Private Practice 8.3 (1990): 93–100.

 

Money, John. ‘Forensic sexology: Paraphilic serial rape (biastophilia) and lust murder (erotophonophilia).’ American Journal of Psychotherapy 64 (1990): 26-36. 

 

Myers,Wade C., Eric Gooch,  and  J. Reid Meloy. ‘The Role of Psychopathy and Sexuality in a Female Serial Killer.’ Forensic Science, 50.3 (May 2005): 1-6.

 

Prentky, Robert, Ann Burgess, Frances Rokous, Austin Lee, Carol Hartman, Robert Ressler and John Douglas. ‘The presumptive role of fantasy in serial sexual homicide.’ The American Journal of Psychiatry. 146.7 (July 1989): 887-891.

 

Sears, Donald J. To Kill Again: The motivation and Development of Serial Murder. Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1991.

 

Silvio, Heather, Kathy McCloskey, and Julia Ramos-Grenier. ‘Theoretical consideration of female sexual predator serial killers in the United States.’ Journal of Criminal Justice 34.3 (2006): 251-259.

 

Stone, Michael H. ‘Serial sexual homicide: biological, psychological, and sociological aspects.’ Journal of Personality Disorders 15.1 (2001): 1-18.

 

Sykes, Graham and David Matza. ‘Techniques of Neutralization: A Theory of Delinquency.’

To insert individual citation into a bibliography in a word-processor, select your preferred citation style below and drag-and-drop it into the document. American Sociological Review 22.6 (1957): 664-670.

 

Williams, S. The Strange Case of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka. Toronto: Little Brown and Co., 1996.

Helen Gavin is Director of Graduate Education at the University of Huddersfield, UK. A Chartered Psychologist, her research interests include female offending and female aggression. In addition to these shadowy worlds, she is also interested in the psychology of culture, including music and folk tales, but has managed to find the darkest aspects of these too.

 

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