Comment on Pfäfflin’s (2008) “Good Enough to Eat”

Abstract

Given that I was the one who twice gave a forensic expert opinion on the case of Armin M., which Pfafflin (2008) described, but who had not seen the patient himself, I think it could be beneficial for the readers of the Journal to have some additional information on this case. Interested readers are referred to a book chapter (Beier, 2005) and a book (Beier, 2007), which not only give detailed information on the case itself (including e-mail correspondence between the offender and his partners), but views the phenomenon of cannibalism in a sexological, cultural, and mythological context, as Pfafflin, who unfortunately made no reference to these publications, tried to do. In the case of Armin M., as in many others, I was assigned by the court to give forensic expert opinion according to the German Law on Legal Responsibility (§§ 20 and 21 German Criminal Code). It was my duty to answer the following questions: (1) Did the accused suffer from a significant clinical disorder (e.g., mental disability) or any other severe mental abnormality (i.e., a personality disorder or a paraphilia) that (2) hindered him to conceive his acts as unlawful or—given he had a sense of wrongdoing—that (3) hindered him to align to the law due to a diminished capacity of control in the course of his actions (so-called diminished or abolished directional capacity)? Armin M. suffered neither from a psychosis nor any other mental illness or any personality disorder. Quite the contrary, he had a normal IQ and his social competence was high. To everybody who had private or professional contact with him, Armin M. (b. 1961) seemed to be an open-minded and friendly contemporary man who, in the forming of contacts, appeared pleasant-natured, flexible, and socially competent, even agile. Even extremely experienced police officers, who could not believe what he had done, had to put on record that, if they had not known about the offence, Armin M. never offered anything conspicuous during the entire period of investigation, which went on for months. During both of the trials, Armin M. presented himself as an unobtrusive and average looking man of his age with a well-groomed outward appearance. He was sexually orientated to males and had a severe paraphilia—a special kind of fetish preference for male flesh. His sexual structure was mainly distinguished by this paraphilic pattern. Furthermore, his feeling of attachment was completely and exclusively focussed on that pattern: He could only experience attachment when the other person was inside of him. Other forms of satisfaction were not available, especially not concerning the intended feeling of enduring attachment. So, before the age of 11 years (and before he reached puberty at 12 years), he was preoccupied by the idea of incorporating another male by eating his flesh. This paraphilia caused him to seek unsolicited partners who pretended to mirror his desire insofar that they should have the wish of being incorporated. It took him years to find such a counterpart using the frighteningly developed subculture on the internet for that purpose, where people with this special inclination can encourage each other: This is ok, slaughtering is ok, if it’s ok for the other party. Eventually, he found Bernd B., the later victim. It was assigned for the forensic-sexual medical report to deal with his motives as well. It was to be assessed to what degree he was suffering from a severe mental disorder, which would give the background for the cannibalistic act as well as previous actions, the severing of his penis, and his slaughter. In K. M. Beier (&) Institute of Sexology and Sexual Medicine, University Clinic Charite, Free and Humboldt-University of Berlin, Luisenstrasse 57, 10117 Berlin, Germany e-mail: klaus.beier@charite.de