According to the “Hare Psycopathy Checklist” a psychopath is a person who knows right from wrong in our society but often feels no guilt, remorse or empathy when they engage in wrong actions. They lie easily, blame others for their actions and often hurt people who are close to them. David Berkowitz meets the criteria of Hare’s checklist and is believed to be a true psychopath. Berkowitz is known as the “Son of Sam”, a thrill seeking serial killer who terrorized the city of New York for over a year. Information about David Berkowitz’s background, personality traits and lifestyle and his serial killer profile help to prove that he is in fact a psychopath. In conclusion, this essay will prove to readers that David Berkowitz is a notorious serial killer that is also a psychopath.
David Berkowitz was born David Falco, the son of Betty Broder. She had married Tony Falco, and had a daughter, Roslyn. The Falcos ran a fish market together, until he left her for another woman. Broder later had an affair with a married real estate agent, Joseph Kleinman. When she became pregnant he threatened to abandon her if she kept the baby, so when David Falco was born, she gave him up for adoption. Three days after Berkowitz was born he was adopted by his adoptive parents Nathan and Pearl Berkowitz. Berkowitz was raised in a middle-class home in the Bronx. He had what seemed to be a normal childhood but Berkowitz and his family knew there was something different about him from an early age and at the age of ten Berkowitz started seeing a therapist. Because of adoption policies Berkowitz’s family told him that his birth mother had died in childbirth with him. This haunted Berkowitz his entire life making him suffer from horrible nightmares as a chi...
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... We can start community lessons to learn about psychopaths as well as teach it in our schools as classes. This will help people to be more aware and to possibly know how to help a psychopath. As an individual you can help yourself by researching more on psychopaths and notifying others in your community. In conclusion, David Berkowitz has been proven to be a serial killer who is also a psychopath and this essay has notified readers about what psychopaths are and how they develop.
Works Cited
http://crime.about.com/od/murder/p/sonofsam.htm
http://www.nndb.com/people/278/000025203/
http://www.biography.com/notorious/crimefiles.do?catId=259456&action=view&profileId=262883&selectedIndex=1§ionName=Crimes
(Soylent Communications, Initials. (2011). NNDB tracking the entire world: David Derkowitz. Retrieved from http://www.nndb.com/people/278/000025203/).
According to the Psychopathy Checklist Revised by Robert Hare, a psychopath is a mentally unstable individual that typically displays insensitive behavior and demonstrates a strong lack of empathy towards others. Psychopaths are described as emotionally shallow and exhibits abnormally violent social behavior. Furthermore, David Berkowitz accurately fits this criterion and is described to be a true psychopath. Berkowitz, recognized as the Son of Sam killer, relentlessly tormented the citizens of New York City for over a year. Throughout his killing spree, Berkowitz murdered six people and injured seven more, amounting to thirteen shootings overall. Consequently, many theories have surfaced in regard to why David Berkowitz murdered his victims, including theories of a possessed canine and a brutal satanic cult. Although theories exist about the Son of Sam killer, evidence shows that David Berkowitz murdered because of psychopathic issues and mental instability.
An analysis of the most famous murderers and serial killers in the Chicago area shows varying degrees of psychopathy or mental illnesses, which ultimately contribute to homicidal comportment. Analysis also shows that...
When we look at how fragile each one of our lives are, we need to take a minute and realize the different characteristics that form us into who we are today. Studies have shown that there are characteristics within the behavior of an individual that can be linked to the specific behaviors demonstrated by an offender that would classify them as a psychopath. Along with other research that looks into an individual’s genetics to see if that plays a role in defining or making a psychopath. John Allen Muhammad, also known as the D.C. sniper, was labeled as a psychopath when he terrorized D.C. for two weeks, taking thirteen victims and killing ten of them. This paper will go over the behaviors that constitute psychopathy, and the behaviors that indicate psychopathic individuals such as John himself. It will also go over John’s life history of what caused him to commit these acts of violence.
For my book report, I have read and evaluated Dr. Hales book titled Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of Psychopaths Among Us, published by The Guilford Press. The purpose of the book was to bring awareness to psychopaths that live among us and will be describe in farther details in the paper. I will evaluated the purpose, strengths, weakness of the book and include a summarized portion for others to understand.
Most serial murderers have been deprived of any control over their home, their body, and their entire life. “Psychokillers take their fantasies and make them a reality living their dreams” (Serial Killers: Nature vs. Nurture 2). Both physical and especially emotional abuse is the consistent, reoccurring factor among a majority of serial killers. Traumatic abuse in childhood has long been viewed as a primary cause of violent behavior in adulthood (Dolan 24). Abusive parents do not generally vent their anger equally on all their children. Such parents tend to unleash the anger and negative emotions on their more difficult children; this potential aggression and physical and emotional abuse of the child shapes the future criminal. “Most serial murders are not classified as psychotics, but rather as psychopaths- their perception of reality is clear except that they feel no social or moral obligations” () Killers are taking control of their own lives through their fantasies in the only way they know fit, through
David Berkowitz, otherwise known as the “Son of Sam”, was notorious for his crimes committed between 1976 and 1977 that ended the lives of six innocent victims and wounded several others in New York (“David Berkowitz Biography”, n.d.). At first, police did not make a connection between the murders because there was nothing unusual about them; all the victims were shot with a 40 caliber gun, not fairly unusual during this time or place especially since the killings were over an extended period of time. Police finally made the connection when Berkowitz began to live behind notes that were meant to tantalize authorities since they had yet to catch him (“David Berkowitz| Son of Sam Killer,” 2015). Often times, the psychological structure of a human
Serial killers have long eluded law enforcement while simultaneously grabbing the attention of the public, and now more than ever, criminal psychologists are beginning to understand what makes a serial killer. In his true-crime documentary, In Cold Blood, Truman Capote depicts the horrifying murders of four members of the Clutter family and the search to find the criminals responsible for the deaths. Eventually, two killers are caught, one being Perry Smith, a detached and emotionless man. And although his carnage of the Clutters labeled him a mass murderer, many of Perry’s personality traits are characteristic of a serial killer. In fact, if detectives had not caught him, Perry could have easily become a serial killer.
'Serial murder'; has long been a term used to describe those human beings that repeatedly commit heinous crimes. It is rare that the average person probes the mind of a serial killer without bias. However, what lies behind the eyes of a serial killer deserves more than the cold hard look that society so often gives (Aaronson, Inter...
Psychopathy; the trait that truly distinguishes humans from ¨machines¨, emotionful to emotionless. Within the novel American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, one may logically assume that the protagonist, Patrick Bateman is indeed implied to be a psycho as the title suggests. However upon further analyzation, Bateman is revealed to be an unreliable narrator, he does not captivate the reader with all of his emotions verbally, for they are revealed through his actions. Bateman certainly does murder people, however, clinically murder doesn´t rule somebody to be a psychopath. Bateman feels no visible remorse for the victims he kills, because Bateman lives in an artificial hyperbole of a yuppie world where no love is shown, all relationships superficial.
...ny requirements for a psychopath, even though a formal test like the PCL-R cannot be completed because he took away his own life before investigation was final. However, he is similar to a few psychopaths that this course studied over the past nine weeks making it possible to compare him. Some aspects are still questionable of Keyes’s, like his childhood, but otherwise he does represent much of what has been learned of the psychopath in this class.
...res of the psychopaths and gives the reader various examples of these individuals playing out these characteristics in everyday life. A widely used checklist is provided so the reader can get a wide spanning view of what is accounted for when scoring a psychopath. This form of research is very important within the deceitfulness of this population; it allows the professional to ignore their words and examine their actions. Hare made it clear that it is not uncommon for there to be an emotional and verbal disconnect from their actions. With virtually no emotional functioning psychopaths feel no remorse for the offenses that they commit and it is very important that we work towards using the opportunities we have to study and assist these populations; not only for them but for ourselves.
The media most often showcases psychopaths as individuals who are inherently evil and dangerous towards themselves and others. Yet, this concept of psychopathy goes far beyond this idea of pure evil and instead necessitates a needed psychological understanding. These individuals, psychopaths, are generally characterized by a lack of empathy and conscience. Indeed, psychopath’s indifference to the repercussions of their actions combined with other characteristics such as hostility and aggression make for a potentially dangerous personality (Lyken, 1996, p.30). In order to identify a psychopath’s recidivism, it is important to differentiate them from sociopaths who, instead of having a psychological impairment that makes it difficult for them to socialize, have been systematically under socialized (Lyken, 1996, p.30). In accordance. psychologists have developed the methods such as the Psychopathy Checklist- Revised (PCL-R) to help identify those with psychopathic tendencies (Walters, 2012, p.409). That is why predictions of recidivism among psychopaths is most efficient when done
Fifty years ago, a person breaking the law would either be called crazy or a criminal. Today, the mental health community has much more specific diagnoses. However, the explanation of certain behaviors may be difficult because there is much overlap among mental conditions. In Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho, the protagonist, Patrick Bateman, is apparently simply a psychopath. However, Bateman can be diagnosed with other mental illnesses such as Asperger’s syndrome, obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, narcissism, and antisocial personality disorder. In both the book and film adaptation, Bateman’s actions can be understood more accurately when analyzed in light of modern psychology.
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