The present study is a review of 20 adult women charged with murdering their children who were referred to a forensic psychiatric hospital for pretrial evaluation. This study compares the demographic, historical, clinical, forensic, and offense characteristics of these women and their victims to samples of multinational, British, and Canadian filicidal women. The data depict a subset of women who suffered from a diagnosable mental disorder and were contending with many acute stressors in their lives with apparently insufficient personal resources or systemic support. The consistency of characteristics across countries suggests that women who kill their children are nonaddicted, married, low-income, mentally ill, new or recent mothers under 30 who, acting alone and without weapons, kill only one of their children, likely of preschool age.
Homicidal youth have received considerable attention in the mass media and social science literature in recent years. Due to several methodological obstacles, relatively little is known about the premorbid and offense characteristics of this population. The current investigation compared 30 juvenile males charged with murder with a group of 62 juvenile males charged with other violent felony offenses. Comparisons were made across 33 demographic, historical, clinical, offense, and forensic characteristics. Both groups were similar in their demographic characteristics and family backgrounds. Juvenile homicide defendants, however, were less likely than the comparison group to have a current Axis I psychiatric diagnosis. Homicide defendants were also more likely to have acted alone and to have committed their alleged crime in a domestic setting. Implications of the results are discussed as are suggestions for future research.
The present study is a review of 20 adult women charged with murdering their children who were referred to a forensic psychiatric hospital for pretrial evaluation. This study compares the demographic, historical, clinical, forensic, and offense characteristics of these women and their victims to samples of multinational, British, and Canadian filicidal women. The data depict a subset of women who suffered from a diagnosable mental disorder and were contending with many acute stressors in their lives with apparently insufficient personal resources or systemic support. The consistency of characteristics across countries suggests that women who kill their children are nonaddicted, married, low-income, mentally ill, new or recent mothers under 30 who, acting alone and without weapons, kill only one of their children, likely of preschool age.
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