Personality Disorders

An aspect of individuality that I find interesting is personality, and what causes certain personality traits to develop. And while thinking about personality-related topics that I could potentially blog about, I saw an episode of “Criminal Minds Behavioral Analysis Unit” that inspired me to look into personality disorders.

This particular episode that I saw involved a schizophrenic hotel employee named Adam. He was shy soft spoken, and compliant. His other personality, however, is that of a woman named Amanda. She is the more protective version of Adam, and he created her as a child as a form of protection for himself. While under the personality of Amanda, he dresses as a woman, takes men back to his room, and rapes and murders them. When he returns to his normal self, however, he has no recollection of any of the crimes he had committed. The issue with this, of course, comes in his arrest and trial. Can he truly be considered guilty of committing these crimes when he has no recollection of them and did not have the intention of murdering? This is where the insanity plea comes in, of course, but I found the topic fascinating. Technically, physically, yes, Adam had committed the crimes. But mentally, emotionally, he had not been connected to the murders, as Amanda was merely another personality of his, and he had not intended to kill and did not recollect what he had done.

Everyone has been told “be yourself”, but what about those with personality disorders? How can you be yourself if you don’t know who you really are? And in the case of someone with a split personality disorder, how can he/she know which of the personality types is really his/hers? So in Adam’s case, who is the real Adam? While he would be arrested and tried under his given name, should “Amanda” be considered a part of him, or a separate person?

The best article I found that walked me through this issue was from the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics and called “Proposition: A Personality Disorder May Nullify Responsibility for a Criminal Act” by Robert Kinscherff. The article states that “A criminal offense requires… proof of misconduct that is specifically prohibited by law (actus reus)” and “proof of sufficient intention or recklessness (mens rea).” Hypothetically taking Adam’s case to court, he is definitely guilty of prohibited misconduct, but not necessarily of intention. Recklessness, possibly. So where can the line be drawn? Further into the article, Kinscherff discusses how to develop an insanity plea, which is an unfortunately long process. While the defendant may already have been found legally insane, he or she also has to be evaluated to determine whether or not his or her potentially criminal act was committed while “functionally impaired in a legally relevant way at the time of the offense.” So, again taking Adam’s case as a hypothetical example, it would have to be proven that he was acting as Amanda while committing the crimes, meaning that his schizophrenia was the reason for his actions.

Personally and realistically, the logistics of an insanity plea seem, well, insane. While schizophrenia is hard enough to understand, the trial process for a criminal schizophrenic it is even more confusing. I believe the situation was handled best in the case on “Criminal Minds”, as Adam was placed in monitored care in mental rehabilitation facility, where he could deal with his schizophrenia and be supervised.