An analysis is offered of a confession given to detectives by a serial killer who, at the time of his arrest, admitted to the murder of 15 men. Qualitative analysis, using Sykes and Matza’s techniques of neutralization as a theoretical base, reveals several attempts to mitigate his crimes and offer some justification to his killings. Through such analysis, it is possible to discern some psychological mechanisms that facilitate the commission of multiple homicides over a period of time, allowing a mentally fit offender to retrospectively rationalize his killings, and even provide some insight into how victims were selected.
This article explores the escalating conflict between European judges and domestic politicians over the issue of whole of life tariffs. After the decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Vinter and Others v. the United Kingdom and the subsequent decision of the Court of Appeal in R v. McLoughlin, there has been a very public tension between the two sides over reviewing prisoner sentences. When bids for release have previously been made by whole life prisoners, most infamously Myra Hindley, the political mood has been defiant. Now Europe has decreed that such prisoners are entitled to an enhanced review of their sentence beyond the possibility of executive release owing to terminal illness, the political stance has further hardened. Instead of enhanced sentence review, the response to Europe has been the announcement of widening the applicability of the tariff to those who kill police or prison officers.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.