Abby Stein

A clinical follow-up of delinquent males: ignored vulnerabilities, unmet needs, and the perpetuation of violence.

OBJECTIVE This paper describes the adult adaptation of a group of 97 formerly incarcerated male delinquents. METHOD Follow-up clinical interviews were administered to subjects, approximately 9 years after discharge from juvenile corrections. The records of the correctional school, state police, FBI, state psychiatric hospitals, and state health department also were reviewed. RESULTS All but six had adult criminal records, most for violent crimes. Only 10% were graduated from high school; 30% received minimal job training; most worked sporadically at unskilled jobs. Few married. Although 35 had fathered children, only 5 were living with them. Psychiatric treatment for identified vulnerabilities was negligible. Upon discharge, the most neuropsychiatrically impaired and violent subjects tended to be placed in adult corrections; the most intact were placed in special schools and psychiatric hospitals. Numbers of vulnerabilities continued to contribute most significantly to violent outcome regardless of placement. Placement in families was associated with fewer adult aggressive offenses than was institutional placement, even while controlling for vulnerabilities and early juvenile violence. CONCLUSION Based on their well-documented early vulnerabilities and needs, this sample of delinquents did not obtain the kinds of supports subsequent to juvenile incarceration that might have enabled them to function independently in society.

The Utility of Contempt

Abstract Among violent criminal offenders, contemptuous feelings toward others—often in response to real or imagined humiliations—often provide an internal justification for senseless acts of brutality. In my forensic work, I have understood contempt—and other so called “negative emotions”—as part of the constellation of dissociated affects and consequent defenses that fuel dire enactments. However, inspired by my work with a private client, I have begun to recognize the potential value of negative affects as a way of freeing women from their enmeshment with brutal partners. In this article I examine the moral and interpersonal consequences of the range of contemptuous thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Through the lens of feminist philosophy and interpersonal psychoanalysis, I suggest ways that such feelings might be liberated from destructive intentions, and repurposed as a catalyst for empowerment and change.

The Sex Monster

Abstract In the clinical literature, the term “parallel process” describes the way in which the dynamics of supervision echo those taking place in the relationship between the therapist and the patient. Gray and Fiscalini (1987) discerned how the same kind of unconscious enactments could occur in any sequence of interpersonal engagements that shared similar characteristics. Sex offenders, forensic practitioners, representatives of the criminal justice system, and the public embody such a dynamic series. Their parallel identifications often drive communal enactments that fuel misguided social policies regarding sex crimes. In this article, I examine how the deep splitting triggered by our own sexual desires and fears has fueled a contemporary hysteria that vilifies strangers, who may not have even committed any serious crimes, while deflecting attention from the most frequent location of sexual offense: the home.