Another psychopathic characteristic displayed in Perry’s personality is “inability to feel guilt or shame.” (Schmalleger, 2017) Clues that Perry left at the crime scene are quite chilling, although can give insight into the mental state he was in at the time of the murder. In a statement about the investigation of the murder, an officer says, “Now, what kind of person would do that - tie up two women, like Bonnie and the girl were tied, and then draw up the bedcovers, tuck them in, like sweet dreams and goodnight? Or the pillow under Kenyon’s head. At first I thought maybe the pillow was there to make him a simpler target. Now I think no, it was done for the same reason the mattress box was spread on the floor - to make the victim more …show more content…
This is where the conflict of convicting people who may show signs of being mentally ill can come into play, but during the 60s in Kansas, that thought wasn't in the minds of the persecutors. Making the victims comfortable did not save Perry from the death penalty. One can also point out yet another characteristic of a psychopathic personality in Perry from this evidence, which is “absence of nervousness of psychoneurotic manifestations.” (Schmalleger, 2017) Perry did not prove to be absolutely crazy in all of his behaviors. As portrayed before, he talked with decent sense when he recognized his lack of opportunity due to his past experiences with life. Perry also didn't flinch when he killed the four Clutter family members, meaning he either had no control of his actions or he knew what he was doing. It was thought that Perry and Richard originally went to the family’s house in attempt to rob them, making it unclear if the intent was to murder as well. Adding robbery into the picture is just another way to further complicate the case and not understand why Perry felt the need to make his victims comfortable. However, these things do not rule out the possibility of a mental illness, but further support the claim that Perry was turned into a sociopath after having gone through all he
Both men went to trial in Garden City. These men went through a psychiatric evaluation, which showed signs of mental illness and emotional dysfunction. Perry was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Dick had brain damage from a car accident as a young adult. Perry finally admitted to all four murders. The doctors stated that this was unconscious retribution for all the bad luck and dissatisfactions from his childhood.
what he did to the family. It took me awhile to get a good impression of Perry.
All of mans behavior comes from somewhere in the universe, but the most important is how we control our emotions. Perry's life story brought him a sense of humor and wisdom to belong deeply to both the community and the land. He shows his responsibility as a fireman saving the lives of women and children, maybe this is the best way he could express his manliness. Perry States, "There is an undeniable thrill in fighting fire. at some level most of us have a perverse hanger for danger, a desire to be tested, to survive fire-a trial by fire literally."
...dent because he was known to hang out in a bar in Santa Cruz where off duty police officers could be found, asking questions about the murders he had committed. He had even applied to become a police officer (Martingale 222). Kemper, by calling the police and describing details of the murders to get them to believe he was the “coed killer,” was finally getting the notoriety and recognition he felt he deserved for the first time in his life. The label of antisocial personality disorder can be applied to Kemper. He paid no attention to the pain and suffering he caused others and completely ignored their individual rights. This behavior started early in his childhood and continued until he became incarcerated. Edmund Kemper III is a sociopath, a psychopath, the “coed killer,” a serial killer, one of the most horrifying and most serious offenders living in prison today.
On pages 307 to 308 of Truman Capote 's novel In Cold Blood, Mrs. Meier is conversing with a friend right after Dick and Perry are guilty of the murder. Mrs. Meier was discussing her relationship with Perry and after the verdict she isolates herself from having to see him. However, Perry becomes “embraced by [his] shame” (308) and cries in front of her, and Mrs. Meier helps comfort him. Perry becomes vulnerable, and she holds his hand like a mother trying to console her child. After Mrs. Meier forces herself to leave Perry alone, she felt heartbroken since no one was there to comfort him. The next day Perry feels standoffish as if he never broke down the day before, and the guards take him to the penitentiary. Right before Perry left, he thanks
His mother was an alcoholic who gave him up to an orphanage run by nuns at the age of 7. Perry’s father, Tex Smith said, “ While my children were with her they run around as they pleased….” Perry and his siblings were left to their own devices and did not have a sense of order. In the example of Nancy, she had a curfew. This meant that Mr. Clutter was aware where she was and concerned about her safety, something a parent should do. The lack of this quality in Perry’s mother helps form Perry’s character today, although he mostly blames his Dad for everything. After all, it was "painful" to imagine that one might be "not just right" - particularly if whatever was wrong was not your own fault but "maybe a thing you were born with." Perry’s mother was not there to show him right from wrong in the years he should’ve learned. It was live and let live. His father later received custody of him and raised him on his own. But Perry later on expressed that he felt inferior to his siblings. Perry’s siblings received an education, something that Perry held a grudge about and also blamed his father for. He went on to explain, “I could’ve been
Perry Smith did not live the happy childhood that he deserved, abandoned by his family at a young age he was forced to live at a terrible orphanage. “The one where Black Widows were always at me. Hitting me. Because of wetting the bed...They hated me, too.” (Capote 132). In this specific orphanage, Perry was beaten by the nuns that own the place. The short sentences within this quote truly emphasize the dramatic and horrible conditions that Perry had to live with in the orphanage. Sympathy is created ...
Being defined by nature or nurture. Isn't enough to make finally decisions about one person. But for some it just might be. Perry Smith had an abusive past. It seems to still haunt him when he looks back on it. But that justify his crimes in anyway. Perry seems to have handles himself very well about the past ,but that isn't enough. Perry Smith on the night of November 15, 1959 was at a point where he made a choice that would affect him for the rest of his life. Perry deep down believes Mr. Clutter is a nice gentlemen and even says so. Yet his actions were done out of the natural nature to him. He then ends up cutting his throat, followed by shooting the rest of his family brutally. In this case, it clearly shows Perry smith as someone who takes up in the naturally
Through the course of the book, Capote uses vivid descriptions to his advantage in order to place emphasis on more noteworthy parts of the story. Capote’s choice of imagery characterizes Perry as a person and gives an idea to who he is. Perry’s life prior to crime was normal for awhile, until his family situation crumbled: “in the ring, a lean Cherokee girl rode a wild horse, a ‘bucking bronc,’ and her loosened hair whipped back and forth, flew about like a flamenco dancer’s. Her name was Flo Buckskin, and she was a professional rodeo performer, a ‘champion bronc-rider.’ So was her husband, Tex John Smith; it was while touring the Western rodeo circuit that the handsome Indian girl and the homely-handsome Irish cowboy had met, married, and had the four children sitting in the grandstand. (And Perry could remember many another rodeo spectacle--see again his father skipping inside a circle of spinning lassos, or his mother, with silver and turquoise bangles jangling on her wrists, trick-riding at a desperado speed that thrilled her youngest child and caused crowds in towns from Texas to Oregon to ‘stand up and clap.’)” Perry’s troubles after his parents separation may very well have contributed to his becoming a murderer later on down the road. The abrupt change in his life at such a young age, clearly had a lasting impact on him and his lifestyle. His past altered the way he thought and the type of person he was. Capote quotes,
the very same man (he) sold Susie to” (Hahn 173). He continued to be cruel to Perry because of his status, and it was only when he got shot he decided to give Perry the
He is the character that most sympathized with because of his past. He never had a connection with his alcoholic mother and siblings. His parents never gave him the love, direction, and the moral values that children need from their parents. This contributed to his behavior. While Perry was testifying, Dr. Jones characterized him with severe mental illness. He mentions that Perry has “paranoid orientation toward the world,” (Capote 297). He goes into further detail by mentioning that Perry “is suspicious and distrustful towards others, tends to feel that others discriminate against him, and feels that others are unfair to him and do not understand him,” (Capote 297). It is completely understandable why Perry would think like this. He was treated horrendously by the nuns in the orphanage and when he lived with his family. Since Perry never had anything good happen to him growing up, he feels like he has to take out his frustration on people who are good. Vengeance for what he did not receive. While in court, Perry mentions why he killed the Clutter family, “It wasn’t because of anything the Clutters did. They never hurt me. Like other people. Like people all my life. Maybe it’s just that the Clutters were the ones who had to pay for it,” (Capote 290). Dr. Jones diagnosis Perry as a paranoid
On pages 265-266 of Capote’s novel, In Cold Blood, Capote writes about Perry’s imprisonment, more specifically Perry’s mental health, or lack thereof. Capote uses an ominous tone to convey the predicament Perry was in and portray the mental instability possessed by Perry. Capote first discusses a failed escape plan of Perry’s that consisted of throwing a document with a detailed rescue plan down to two men who often gathered below his window, thinking that they were there for him. However, as soon as he created the document, the men stopped coming. The strangeness of this scenario pushed Perry to question his sanity. Regarding this, Capote says, “a notion that he ‘might not be normal, maybe insane’ troubled him” (Capote 265). When Capote says that these issues
Perry Smith was a short man with a large torso. At first glance, “he seemed a more normal-sized man, a powerful man, with the shoulders, the arms, the thick, crouching torso of a weight lifter. [However] when he stood up he was no taller than a twelve-year old child” (15). What Smith lacked in stature, he made up in knowledge. Perry was “a dictionary buff, a devotee of obscure words” (22). As an adolescent, he craved literature and loved to gain insight of the imaginary worlds he escaped into, for Perry’s reality was nothing less than a living nightmare. “His mother [was] an alcoholic [and] had strangled to death on her own vomit” (110). Smith had two sisters and an older brother. His sister Fern had committed suicide by jumping out of a window and his brother Jimmy followed Fern’s suit and committed suicide the day after his wife had killed herself. Perry’s sister, Barbara, was the only normal one and had made a good life for herself. These traumatic events left Perry mentally unstable and ultimately landed him in jail, where he came into acquaintance with Dick Hickock, who was in jail for passing bad checks. Dick and Perry became friends and this new friendship changed the course of their lives forever. Hickock immediately made note of Perry’s odd personality and stated that there was “something wrong with Little Perry. Perry could be such a kid, always wetting his bed and crying in his sleep. And often [Dick] had seen him sit for hours just sucking his thumb. In some ways old Perry was spooky as hell. Take, for instance, that temper of his of his. He could slide into a fury quicker than ten drunk Indians. And yet you wouldn’t know it. He might be ready to kill you, but you’d never know it, not to look at it or listen to it” (108). Perry’s short fuse and dysfunctional background were the two pieces to Perry’s corrupt life puzzle that soured and tainted the final “picture”.
He grew up in a different environment with a broken family with no apparent dreams. As a young boy his parents separated and he was forced to go with his mother. He later ran away to be with his father who turned him down and ended up being abandoned by his family completely. He then came to stay at a catholic orphanage, where he was abused by nuns and caregivers. His father finally decided to take him into his care and together they got away and traveled, ending his education before passing the third grade which bothered him as he became older. Perry joined the marines and army, then came back to relocate his father. Him and his father had a breakthrough over starvation, leaving Perry with no one else to turn to and therefore getting involved in committing crimes. Once he got caught and jailed, his mother had died and his brother and sister had both committed suicide. By all his experiences we can say Perry definitely lived a different life and his family portrayal was very different from the Clutters. After so much abandonment and abuse, we can understand why he almost feels nothing and how growing up has affected him. The American Dream for Perry might not have been a “perfect family” but may have been to find something with order, and control. The dream Perry’s family would be focused on is reaching a decent life as their past has been