Serious sex offending against women by men with schizophrenia

1999 ◽  
Vol 174 (3) ◽  
pp. 233-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan D. Smith ◽  
Pamela J. Taylor

BackgroundLittle is known about men who commit sex offences in the context of psychosis.AimsTo examine the relationship of illness and psychotic symptoms to sex offending in men with schizophrenia.MethodA search of Home Office records was completed for all 84 male restricted hospital order in-patients with schizophrenia, resident in any hospital in England and Wales during May 1997, with an index conviction for a contact sex offence against a woman.ResultsAt the time of their index offences 80 men were psychotic and half of them had delusions or hallucinations related to the offences. Specific delusional or hallucinatory drive was pertinent in only 18 men but the majority of men committed their first sex offence after onset of schizophrenia. Exclusive sex offending was uncommon.ConclusionsWhen a man with schizophrenia commits a serious sex offence the illness is, more commonly than not, relevant to that offence even though a direct symptom relationship may be relatively unusual.

Urban Science ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Marianna Charitonidou

Takis Zenetos was enthusiastic about the idea of working from home, and believed that both architecture and urban planning should be reshaped in order to respond to this. He supported the design of special public spaces in residential units, aiming to accommodate the inhabitants during working hours. This article argues that Zenetos’s design for “Electronic Urbanism” was more prophetic, and more pragmatic, than his peers such as Archigram and Constant Nieuwenhuys. Despite the fact that they shared an optimism towards technological developments and megastructure, a main difference between Zenetos’s view and the perspectives of his peers is his rejection of a generalised enthusiasm concerning increasing mobility of people. In opposition with Archigram, Zenetos insisted in minimizing citizens’ mobility and supported the replacement of daily transport with the use advanced information technologies, using terms such as “tele-activity”. Zenetos was convinced that “Electronic Urbanism” would help citizens save the time that they normally used to commute to work, and would allow them to spend this time on more creative activities, at or near their homes. The main interest of “Electronic Urbanism” lies in the fact that it not only constitutes an artistic contribution to experimental architecture, but is also characterized by a new social vision, promising to resynchronize practices of daily life. An aspect that is also examined is the relationship of Zenetos’s ideas and those of the so-called Metabolists in the 1960s in Japan, including Kenzo Tange’s conception of megastructures. Zenetos’s thought is very topical considering the ongoing debates about the advanced information society, especially regarding the social concerns of surveillance, governance, and sovereignty within the context of Big Data. His conception of “tele-activities” provides a fertile terrain for reflecting on potential implications and insights concerning home-office conditions not only within the context of the current pandemic situation but beyond it as well.


1990 ◽  
Vol 157 (3) ◽  
pp. 430-433 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Argyle

Of 20 patients attending a clinic for maintenance therapy of schizophrenia, seven had regular panic attacks, and these were often associated with agoraphobia and social phobia. Similar fears and avoidance in other cases were associated with paranoid ideas and negative symptoms. The relationship of panic to psychotic symptoms varied greatly. In two patients neuroleptics were associated with an increase in panic attacks.


2000 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 223-228 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan D Smith

Very little is known about the nature of serious sex offences against women by psychotic men. This study aimed to examine such offences by carrying out a search of Home Office records for all 80 male restricted hospital order in-patients with schizophrenia, resident in any hospital in England and Wales during May 1997, with an index conviction for a contact sex offence against a woman, committed whilst psychotic. Offences peaked in the afternoon, but were proportionally distributed according to day and month. Most (47/59%) offences occurred indoors, with over half of these in the victim's home. Assailants were strangers in 49 (61%) offences. Offences involving strangers were more likely to occur outdoors and without any preceding social interaction compared to those involving assailants known to their victims. Offenders' speech tended to be impersonal, with little attempt at intimacy. Offence sexual behaviours were: breast/genital fondling 63 (79%), vaginal intercourse 42 (52%), fellatio eight (10%), anal intercourse seven (9%), and cunnilingus six (8%). Excessive violence or bizarre behaviour occurred in a minority of offences. The findings are discussed with reference to the literature on sex offences by men without mental illness. The data do not support anecdotal or popular images that most psychotic sex attackers behave in an exceptionally violent or bizarre manner.


1994 ◽  
Vol 165 (3) ◽  
pp. 353-356 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. O'Callaghan ◽  
P. C. Sham ◽  
N. Takei ◽  
G. Murray ◽  
G. Glover ◽  
...  

BackgroundRecently, several investigators have reported an association between influenza epidemics and increased birth rates of ‘preschizophrenic’ individuals some four to six months later. Here we examine whether maternal exposure to other infectious diseases can also predispose the foetus to later schizophrenia.MethodTwo independent sets of dates of birth of first admission schizophrenic patients, born between 1938 and 1965 in England and Wales, were obtained from the Mental Health Enquiry in England and Wales. Data on the number of deaths per month from 16 infectious diseases between 1937 and 1965 in England and Wales were also collected. We used a Poisson regression model to examine the relationship between deaths from infectious diseases and schizophrenic births.ResultsIn the two separate data sets, increased national deaths from bronchopneumonia preceded, by three and five months respectively, increased numbers of schizophrenic births. We did not find any other significant associations between schizophrenic births and any of the other 15 infectious diseases.ConclusionsThe association between deaths from bronchopneumonia and increased schizophrenic births some months later may be a reflection of the fact that bronchopneumonia deaths increase markedly during influenza epidemics.


1998 ◽  
Vol 4 (6) ◽  
pp. 364-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Neill

The article by Byrne gives a general overview of dementia with Lewy bodies (LBD) and discusses treatment in terms of modulation of neurotransmitter systems, treatment of psychotic symptoms and extrapyramidal features. However, as is the case with Alzheimer's disease, the dementia is related to underlying pathological processes which result in death and/or malfunction of neurons. Prevention or amelioration of this neuronal loss is therefore the ultimate aim of treatment. Such treatment is not yet available and the possibility of its development is likely to depend on further elucidation of the underlying pathological process. The relationship of LBD to Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease should be considered, as this is important for the determination of the underlying pathological processes in LBD.


Author(s):  
Mike McConville ◽  
Luke Marsh

This book on the criminal justice system is uniquely positioned to examine judicial claims to independence, the politics of the judiciary, the rule of law, and the role of the executive in the context of a democratic polity. The authors have mined the British government’s archival vaults to assemble records including official (previously classified) Home Office files and present a ground-breaking narrative. By tracking the relationship between senior judges and the Home Office from the end of the nineteenth century to the modern day, revelations concerning the politics of the judiciary and the separation of powers are unearthed. The book argues that the claims of the senior judiciary to be independent of the executive are invalidated by historical records and the theory and practice of the separation of powers (the ‘Westminster Model’) deeply flawed. Rather, at every material point, civil servants compromised the role of the senior judiciary’s decision-making. Moreover, with the passive endorsement of senior judges, the executive repeatedly misled Parliament as to the authorship and provenance of fundamental rules governing the relationship of the individual to the state in relation to police powers of arrest, detention, and questioning. The book also explores the past and continuing impact of all this to former colonial territories and traces the close liaison between key members of the senior judiciary and the state in reconfiguring the modern criminal process in a way which weakens defence lawyers, pressurizes defendants into pleading guilty, and undermines cardinal adversarial protections.


Clay Minerals ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 165-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. J. Loveland ◽  
I. G. Wood ◽  
A. H. Weir

AbstractSoil clay mineralogy at Rothamsted began in the early 1930s, and quickly focused on technique, swelling minerals, micas and sorption phenomena. By the mid-1940s interest had extended to the formation and spatial distribution of soil clays with the move of the Soil Survey of England and Wales to Rothamsted. These themes continued for the next 40 years. Considerable contributions were made to crystal chemistry and structure determinations, and the relationship of these to the sorption and desorption of water and organic molecules, and the behaviour of soil K. The pattern of soil clay mineralogy was determined for large parts of England and Wales, and absorbed into soil mapping. The work on X-ray diffraction appeared in the Mineralogical Society Monographs on this subject. These, and the Monograph on Clay Chemistry, which reached their final form in the 1980s, are the lasting monuments to soil clay mineralogical research at Rothamsted.


2001 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 381-400 ◽  
Author(s):  
ROSS M. G. NORMAN ◽  
ASHOK K. MALLA

Background. The concept of duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) has recently attracted much interest because of its possible relationship to treatment outcome and implications for preventive efforts with reference to psychotic disorders, especially schizophrenia. In this paper we review critically the literature concerning the concept and its importance.Methods. Articles concerned with measuring DUP and those that have been suggested to provide indirect or direct evidence of the effect of DUP on treatment outcome are reviewed.Results. Evidence thus far suggests that DUP may be related to ease of reducing psychotic symptoms once treatment begins for first episode patients, but there is no evidence of a relationship to likelihood of relapse. There has been little investigation of the relationship of DUP to other long-term outcomes such as negative symptoms and cognitive functioning neither have the possible confounds of DUP been widely investigated or controlled.Conclusions. It is important that there should be more thorough investigations of DUP, its correlates, and the extent to which it does mediate any advantages of earlier intervention.


Author(s):  
Joseph Walsh

Psychotic symptoms, which are significant features of several mental disorders, can severely compromise a client’s ability to engage successfully in interpersonal relationships. All psychosocial interventions depend on a practitioner’s ability to establish a positive relationship with a client, but this can be especially difficult with psychotic persons due to their irrational perceptions of the world. Still, it is important to realize that these clients want to experience interpersonal connections even as they are often fearful of risking them. Only by developing an appreciation for the lived experience of psychotic clients can social workers maximize their potential to develop a relationship of trust. The purposes of this chapter are to examine the relationship capacities of clients who are psychotic and to present strategies for social workers to engage with them.


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