Abstract
The following paper discusses three offenders from three recent incidents. The discussion will strive to analyze the behavior of these offenders and their justification for their behavior from the available details regarding the incidents.
Girl who shot herself in leg at Grady High out of jail
The details of the incident can be found at http://waga.m0bl.net/r/1fa2kd.
Morgan Tukes a senior at Gradys High School is only 17 years of age and is accused of several charges including accidentally shooting herself in the school parking lot. The 17 year old was also accused of hit and run charges in October. Her charges involved fleeing and attempting to elude, reckless driving, obstruction and aggravated assault towards an officer. One other news source states that the gun she brought to school was also stolen.
The aggressive and assaultive teenagers are currently a big question in psychological as well as sociological studies. Different studies have prompted with different reasons why children and especially those in teenagers involve in offensive behavior. The offender in this case Morgan Tukes also reflects a so called stereotype as defined by most of the researchers regarding aggressive teenagers. Most researchers suggest that African American teenagers are more probable to get involved in criminal activities as soon as in high school than other ethnicity teenagers. The figure 1 also shows that the rate of arrests for African American teenagers is visibly higher than other ethnic groups. The aggression or anger is a teenager is usually associated with their surroundings according to the Contemporary social ecology theory and differential association theory especially their parents, siblings and neighborhood. The behavior of Morgan Tukes also presents the same scenario as her behavior seems like a self chosen distraction from her surroundings. Teenagers often choose negative behavior to get attention from others. It has often been seen that teachers or peers at school stay away from certain kids due to typical stereotyping, thus the kids feel isolated and frustrated. These acts of criminal attitude represent an attention seeking behavior also aggravated by surrounding factors. According to the news report Morgan’s parents repeatedly assure that she is a good child overall however the gun she used to shot herself was stolen, considering the access limit a teenager can have most chances are that she stole it from her own home.
The available details of this young offender imply that she is a frustrated teenager due to lack of attention, appreciation and acceptance from her surroundings that has provoked a felonious attitude in order to grab the attention.
Ex-con accused of sneaking back into NYC jails
detailed news report at http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/ammer_scammer_Zg7Wb9CJlwWfAzIcxIFNmO
the news report states that an ex-con, who had previously served sentence twice was seen impersonating as an officer to sneak back into the NYC jail. The same felon was also arrested previously to impersonate board of education staff to look through school’s student files. The behavior of Matagrano, represents a common psychological case of identity crisis. Sometimes people come from families and backgrounds that bring misery and troubles for them , their earliest memories of life are harsh and unpleasant thus leaving them in a confused state regarding their personalities. This lack of self confidence sometime in severe cases, translates into identity crisis that can urge a person to impersonate as someone else . It is observed that people tend to impersonate people who had influence on them or proved to be stronger than them. In this case, as the offender has a history of being convicted and arrested several times, thus probably he saw the correction officers or police as being stronger beings than him and thus made him believe that if he could act like them he could be more powerful and authoritative. According to some psychology experts, identities have strong coercive impact on our surrounding society, as the news report shows that the offender utilized this impersonation to roam around the secure facility in order to prove that he had the authority and access to the most privileged areas due to the role he was playing. Role based identities such as a policeman are associated with some specific characteristics such as authority, power and prestige, the offender seems to fulfill his needs for these attributes by playing the make believe role of police officer.
The offender was already arrested and charged with various crimes previously including sex offences, the impersonation or identity theft is apparently a different path from his history. The reasons behind this could be an inherent need of change in his personality and its reflection as to how he would want others to see him rather than a sex offender.
Jury sees sick images at 'cannibal cop' trial
Details of the news report are available at http://www.ajc.com/news/ap/crime/agent-cop-said-cannibalism-interest-hurt-his-life/nWf9z/
The offender in this news report Gilberto Valle is a NYC police officer; he is accused of cannibalism and involvement of torturing and killing 6 women including his wife. The charges on the alleged police officer were based upon his interest in cannibalism and abusive websites The FBI forensics team investigated his internet browsing history and a number of videos and images stored at his computer. According to the investigation reports Vaile had a huge collection of disturbing images showing torturing women and of mutilated dead bodies.
The account of the offender’s browsing history does not necessarily imply that he had been involved in cannibalism, though he might have interest and might have been curious about it. An interest in cannibalism or a curiosity regarding torturing, abusing or killing women suggests that the offender might try to practice what he has learned or seen in part or completely. Whether the offender had committed the alleged crimes is not known at this time however it implies a psychological personality disorder. Most often the urge of cannibalism is associated with sexual sadism and clinically is believed to be a symptom that the offender has psycho-sexual disorder. The offender in this case might also be on a verge of psycho sexual disorder and in initial phase might feel the pleasure just by looking at these disturbing images and videos. The personality disorders are also linked with the overall life experiences of a person. Development of a severe disorder such as cannibalism has connections with violent and unhappy memories of the past. The offender’s involvement in the websites and his browser history suggest that he wanted to know more and more and if he had not committed the charged crimes he seems to be prone to commit them in near future.
References
Fearon, J. D. (1999). What Is Identity. Stanford University.
Gamble, A. (2011). The Psychology Behind Cannibalism. Crime Case Files.
Tucker-Ladd, D. C. (2011). Psychological Self-Help. http://www.psychologicalselfhelp.org/.
