Crime Classification Manual Part I Chapter 4 19

 

Crime Classification Manual Part I Chapter 4 19

A STANDARD SYSTEM FOR INVESTIGATING AND CLASSIFYING VIOLENT CRIMES

SECOND EDITION

John E. Douglas, Ann W. Burgess, Allen G. Burgess, and Robert K. Ressler, Editors

 

Thus, a given fact pattern might relate very much to sadism and would be condensed under the heading of “actions that cause a victim emotional suffering.” Or a perpetrator who enlists followers into active criminality may be, according to the construct of antisocial by proxy, represented well by “involving another person in the crime in order to maximize destructiveness.”

After expanding the list of potential intents, actions, and attitudes to encompass the range of imagination for potential crimes, the Depravity Standard research project identified twenty-six items for closer study by April 2001 (Welner, 2001). These items focus on the depravity of a crime: that is, what is depraved. The items are event, history, and fact driven. Questions of who is depraved, or evil, are more diagnostic and addressed through the psychiatric diagnoses or theological sources. Questions of why, or context, are well addressed in mitigation evidence and its rebuttal; the Depravity Standard does not replace these elements of a case, as it confines itself to the circumstances of the crime.