Serial cat killer - part of the homicidal triad, y’all

Singapore hunts for serial cat killer. You all know I’m obsessed with true crime and behavioural profiling. And there is something known as the homicidal triad:

Typically, a significant part of the developmental process of persons showing very violent, antisocial tendencies is the so-called homicidal triad, consisting of enuresis - or bed-wetting - at an inappropriate age, cruelty to small children and/or animals, and fire starting, which suggest an underlying frustration with lack of control (The Anatomy of Motive, Douglas, J.E., Olshaker, M.).

I think our cat killer is obviously someone who is a very inadequate personality, and sees cats as living beings they can easily dominate, thus wielding the power of life and death. While I support a strong custodial penalty as a deterrent to non-sociopathic personalities (although someone just ‘fooling around’ who chooses to seriously injure, maim, and/or kill an animal definitely has something wrong with them), it will not stop those who are sociopaths. They’ll just try to cover their traces better.

There’s an older Cat Welfare Society t-shirt I’ve got with a Gandhi saying that I’m sure everyone knows by now: “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” No animal should be wilfully hurt. If the abuser is of the pathologically sadistic type, they may escalate to small children, because they will be perceived to be defenceless as well (and their terror possibly more satisfying). And just so you know, Stanton E. Samenow, Ph.D., another respected criminal psychologist, says:

“You cannot rehabilitate someone who has never been habilitated in the first place.”

Which is a bit of a worry.

(Quote from William Gairdner.com; I have Inside the Criminal Mind, but I’m not about to go through all mentions in the index to locate the page reference right now.)

• 6 Sep 2006