Past Offenses Research Articles

Signifiers of desistance from a positive criminology perspective: The case of responsibility taking in restorative proceedings

Restorative Justice is a framework of mutual dialogue that offers people involved in wrongdoings, a more profound understanding of the harms experienced by the victims of the offense. It does this by applying the notions of responsibility taking and accountability differently from the traditional retributive criminal justice systems: instead of passively enduring a punishment, the prepetrator proactively seeks to remediate the harm caused. The aim of this study, the first of its kind in Israel, was to examine the subjective perceptions of graduates of the Geffen Victim-Offender Mediation Program, operated by the Adult Probation Service in Israel, of their past offenses. Through narrative analysis of the personal accounts of people who offended and took part in Restorative Justice dialogue proceedings, we found that they acknowledged and took responsibility for their transgressions and their manifold consequences—coupled with remorse, shame, and a desire to make amends. Participants also noted the positive attitude of the probation officers who helped them in the process. The article discusses these findings from the perspective of positive criminology and desistance theory.

Православная церковь на Урале в период Великой Отечественной войны

By the summer of 1941, everything indicated that the Russian Orthodox Church was finishing its last months, if not days. Two decades and more of total persecution by the militant atheists in power had brought it literally “to its last stand”. The vast majority of Orthodox churches were closed, ruined, desecrated, or even demolished to the ground. According to some reports there were only two active churches for the entire vast territory from the TransUrals to the Pacific Ocean. The situation was no better with the clergy. Many thousands of them in earlier years were either shot or sent to camps (in fact, to a slow death), and those who remained free were forced to abandon their church ministries... But suddenly there came a turning point marked by the exact date - June 22, 1941, when the attack on the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany began the Great Patriotic War which raised the question of the very existence of our country and its multinational people. In this situation the authorities had involuntarily to think about muting internal divisions. The fight against religion was quickly curtailed, and in the end (two years later) the Orthodox Church was given "most favored treatment"... The clergy en masse took a patriotic stand from the early days of the war forgetting all past offenses and fully embracing the slogan "Everything for the front, everything for victory”. Some of its representatives fought with dignity in the ranks of the active army, others worked selflessly on the home front and those in church service (very few of them at first, but then their number grew steadily) were everywhere collecting funds for the defense. And their contribution to the Victory was greatly appreciated by the Soviet government; for the first time since 1917 clergy received government awards... In this article it is provided a comprehensive look at the activities of the Russian Orthodox Church during the Great Patriotic War within the borders of the "Great Urals" (and the territories surrounding it). Along with a synthesis of materials previously published the composition of the clergy serving at that time in a number of Ural regions was analyzed for the first time on the basis of the Ural Church-Historical Society database which, in particular, allowed to conclude about its multiple quantitative reduction and a sharp decline in qualitative level in comparison with the pre-revolutionary period.

Is mindfulness associated with interpersonal forgiveness?

Using a multimethod approach, the current research tested the basic prediction that mindfulness is associated with interpersonal forgiveness. Across 5 studies, we found that mindfulness meditation, trait mindfulness, and an experimental induction of mindfulness, were positively associated with indicators of both dispositional forgiving tendencies, state levels of forgiveness regarding a past offense, and levels of perceived forgiving tendencies as rated by the romantic partner. Two studies examined the roles of perspective taking and rumination as potential mechanisms; results provided most consistent support for the role of perspective taking. The findings are discussed in light of the broader theoretical questions of when and how people forgive and how mindfulness may promote interpersonal functioning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Lingering guilt and shame: Emotional burdens upon those who intended but failed to apologize

ABSTRACT Prior research has shown that greater willingness to apologize for an offense is prompted by greater guilt but lesser shame. Yet little work examined whether apologies indeed resolve moral emotions. This study investigated how the absence of apology psychologically affects harm-doers when they recall a past offense. Undergraduates (N = 284) were randomly assigned to one of the four experimental conditions wherein they recalled a past incident in which they hurt, offended, angered, or had some other negative effect on another person. Harm-doers who intended but failed to apologize reported greater PFQ-2 state guilt and shame, compared to others who refused to apologize or whose apologies were rejected. However, similar results were not found for ESS state shame. Results suggest that failing to apologize may impede transgressors from relieving moral emotional burdens, but only for those who intended to apologize.

Working through past wrongdoing: Examination of a self-forgiveness counseling intervention.

This pilot study examined the effectiveness of a new emotion-focused individual counseling intervention designed to increase self-forgiveness for regretted actions committed against another person. Exactly 26 adult participants (21 completers) who indicated they had unresolved emotions about a past offense enrolled in the study and were randomly assigned to a delayed or immediate treatment condition. Controlling for screening scores, participants who received the treatment had significantly lower self-condemnation and significantly greater self-forgiveness regarding their offense at the end of treatment than did participants who spent time on a waiting list. Again controlling for screening scores, participants who received the treatment had significantly lower general psychological distress and significantly greater trait self-compassion at the end of treatment than did participants who spent time on a waiting list. All treatment gains were maintained at 2-month follow-up. In addition, increases in state self-forgiveness over the course of the intervention predicted lower levels of general psychological distress follow-up. Results of this study demonstrate the utility of this new intervention for helping clients resolve the negative residual effects of unforgiveness toward the self, both for offense-specific and general well-being outcomes.

Punishment.

Retributivism is a deontological theory of punishment that calls for the deserved punishment of a guilty offender in proportion with his moral blameworthiness for a past offense. It is often referred to as punishment based on 'just deserts', and it contrasts with consequentialist theories that ground punishment in its potentially beneficial future consequences. Rich philosophical debate surrounds the appropriateness of retributivism. From a psychological perspective, the key question concerns whether retributivism underlies ordinary individuals' desire for the legal punishment of wrongdoers. Past research in social psychology has answered this question in the affirmative. However, much of this existing evidence requires a new look, because it is premised on a fundamental ambiguity. We review alternative evidence for the existence of retributive motives from lesser-known correlational studies, and from studies of the punishment of companies and animals. We also explore the links between retributivism and restorative justice-an alternative justice approach that focuses on repairing the harms caused by an offense. Although often cast as diametrically opposed to one another, retributive and restorative justice in fact share more in common than is often supposed. Both are premised on notions of deservingness, and their goals can be achieved by the same action (i.e., retributive punishment can restore victims). In all areas of the research we review, more work is needed to better understand: retributivism directed at human offenders, the commonalities and discontinuities between retributive and restorative justice, and how the notion of desert structures moral life and thought more generally. WIREs Cogn Sci 2014, 5:561-572. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1301 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website. The authors have declared no conflicts of interest for this article.

Efficacy of psychotherapeutic interventions to promote forgiveness: A meta-analysis.

This meta-analysis addressed the efficacy of psychotherapeutic interventions to help people forgive others and to examine moderators of treatment effects. Eligible studies reported quantitative data on forgiveness of a specific hurt following treatment by a professional with an intervention designed explicitly to promote forgiveness. Random effects meta-analyses were conducted using k = 53 posttreatment effect sizes (N = 2,323) and k = 41 follow-up effect sizes (N = 1,716) from a total of 54 published and unpublished research reports. Participants receiving explicit forgiveness treatments reported significantly greater forgiveness than participants not receiving treatment (Δ+ = 0.56 [0.43, 0.68]) and participants, receiving alternative treatments (Δ+ = 0.45 [0.21, 0.69]). Also, forgiveness treatments resulted in greater changes in depression, anxiety, and hope than no-treatment conditions. Moderators of treatment efficacy included treatment dosage, offense severity, treatment model, and treatment modality. Multimoderator analyses indicated that treatment dosage (i.e., longer interventions) and modality (individual > group) uniquely predicted change in forgiveness compared with no-treatment controls. Compared with alternative treatment conditions, both modality (individual > group) and offense severity were marginally predictive (ps < .10) of treatment effects. It appears that using theoretically grounded forgiveness interventions is a sound choice for helping clients to deal with past offenses and helping them achieve resolution in the form of forgiveness. Differences between treatment approaches disappeared when controlling for other significant moderators; the advantage for individual interventions was most clearly demonstrated for Enright-model interventions, as there have been no studies of individual interventions using the Worthington model.

Dead Ends by Erin Jade Lange (review)

Reviewed by: Dead Ends by Erin Jade Lange Elizabeth Bush Lange, Erin Jade Dead Ends. Bloomsbury, 2013 [288p] Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-61963-080-2 $17.99 Library ed. ISBN 978-1-61963-081-9 $12.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 9-12 Dane Washington, a sixteen-year-old with serious anger management issues, is just a detention away from alternative high school, but he finds his last best hope in the unwanted friendship of Billy D., a student with Down syndrome who latches onto Dane for protection. The administration cuts Dane a deal: keep Billy D. safe and content, and they’ll blink at his past offenses. The problem is that Billy D. is no dummy; he’s a master manipulator and a skillful if judicious liar, and he has his own important agenda—to locate his missing father, whom Billy D’s mother is determined to keep him from finding. Dane’s also curious about the identity of his own dad, a man who is probably somewhere in the neighborhood, and whom he’d enjoy the opportunity to punch out. Billy D. essentially blackmails Dane into helping him trace the clues in an old atlas he’s sure will lead to his father, and on a mission that culminates in a dangerous road trip, the boys figure out there’s a very good reason why Billy D.’s father should not be found. The odd-couple story deftly pairs Billy D.’s cleverness with Dane’s inability to keep his itchy fists out of trouble, and it gains considerable momentum from the atlas clues and the mysteries behind each of the boy’s fathers. Dane, however, fails to become the likable, or even redeemable, character readers are expecting, and the romance plot between Dane and an edgy, skateboarding blonde never quite gets off the ground. Still, it’s a fast-moving tale tailor-made for reading in study hall, when a road trip of any kind sounds really good. Copyright © 2013 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

What if Theologians Took Evolution Seriously

A noted theologian who has been engaged in the dialogue between theology and science invites readers to reflect on how a serious consideration of evolution could impact our lives, particularly our understanding of suffering. An evolutionary lens can change a view of suffering perceived as rooted in past human offenses and the need for expiation to one open to eschatological hope for all life in our world. I f theologians took evolution more seriously than they have in the past, I believe it would lead to constructive shifts in our thoughts about God, the meaning of our lives, our sense of human destiny and the meaning of suffering and redemption. By evolution I mean the conventional Darwinian—and now neo-Darwinian— understanding of the journey of life on earth. It would be salutary for theology to steep itself fully in the best and most up-to-date versions of evolutionary biology. Like all science, Darwin’s portrait of life is subject to constant revision. However, what will remain, no matter how much science shifts in the future, is the disclosure of life’s long struggle. And taking into account the pre-human chapters of evolution can allow theology to give voice to the silent striving of an entire universe, and not just human life, for the redemption promised by God. I shall focus my comments on the suffering in evolution. However, it is necessary first to look at the question of whether evolution admits of any plausible theological interpretation whatsoever. After all, many Darwinians subscribe to a

Human Dignity in Criminal Procedure: A Comparative Overview of Israeli and German Law

German constitutional law proclaims to grant human dignity “absolute” protection, whereas Israeli law permits a weighing of human dignity against other important interests. In spite of this difference in principle, German and Israeli law arrive at remarkably similar results with respect to the regulation of “dignity-sensitive” areas of criminal procedure, such as the privilege against self-incrimination, the search of the body and the home of suspects, and secret surveillance of private communications. With regard to privileged conversations, Israeli law provides for even stronger safeguards against state intrusion than German law. The protection against forced self-incrimination, by contrast, goes further under German law. In order to optimize the protection of human dignity in the criminal process, the authors suggest a strict distinction between measures designed to investigate past offenses and those aimed at preventing crime.

Having the Power to Forgive: When the Experience of Power Increases Interpersonal Forgiveness

The present research examined the association between power, defined in terms of experienced control over outcomes and resources in a relationship, and interpersonal forgiveness. Based on recent findings in the literature suggesting that power is associated with goal directedness, it was hypothesized that high levels of experienced power should facilitate forgiveness, in particular in relationships of strong commitment. The results of three studies, using both correlational and experimental designs, supported this prediction: Power was positively associated with forgiveness, but this effect was stronger in relationships of strong (rather than weak) commitment. This pattern of results was observed for both the inclination to forgive hypothetical offenses and actual forgiveness regarding a past offense. Study 3 provided some preliminary evidence for the role of rumination in the link between power and forgiveness. Implications of these findings for the literature on forgiveness and the literature on social power are discussed.

African American women on the possibilities of a relationship with an ex-offender

This article presents the perceptions of 487 African American university women on their willingness to stay committed to an incarcerated person and their willingness to enter a committed romantic relationship with an ex-offender. The women were given a survey with closed and open-ended questions. Descriptive statistics, chi-square, binary logistic regression, and qualitative text analyses were performed. The results indicate that while the women were inclined to remain faithful to incarcerated husbands, they were largely not inclined to be faithful to boyfriends. A majority would consider giving an ex-offender a chance at a committed romantic relationship depending on the ex-offender's past offense, and/or, if there were clear signs that the ex-offender had indeed changed for the better. The article offers a rare insight into the mind-set of African American women on many of the men in their communities. This is significant given the apparent importance of a committed intimate relationship in the successful reintegration of ex-offenders.

Theological Considerations—Hermeneutical, Ecclesiological, Eschatological Regarding Memory and Reconciliation: The Church and the Faults of the Past

AbstractThis article analyzes the International Theological Commission's Memory and Reconciliation: The Church and the Faults of the Past (MR). The document offers methodological reflections about how to proceed in implementing Pope John Paul II's call for the church to ask for forgiveness for past offenses at the dawn of the third millennium of Christianity. MR thus seeks to clarify “the reasons, the conditions, and the exact form of the requests for forgiveness for the faults of the past.” The article raises some specific concerns regarding the three operative distinctions that MR proposes to be applied: between the holiness of the church emphatically differentiated from holiness (and sinfulness) in the church; between church and social context in making historical and theological judgments; and between magisterium and authority in the church (that allows MR to explain how behavior contrary to the Gospel by persons vested with authority in the church need not imply involvement of the magisterial charism).

Concurrent cross-validation of the Self-Appraisal Questionnaire: a tool for assessing violent and nonviolent recidivism and institutional adjustment on a sample of North Carolina offenders.

The aim of this study was to determine whether the Self-Appraisal Questionnaire (SAQ), a tool that was found to be reliable and valid for assessing violent and nonviolent recidivism and institutional adjustment for Canadian offenders, would also be valid for the same purposes with a demographically different population of North Carolina offenders. The internal consistency alphas and SAQ total and subscale scores' correlations were high. Offenders with high SAQ total scores had significantly more violent offenses, had more total number of past offenses, had higher numbers of past arrests, and had more institutional infractions than those with low SAQ scores. There were no significant differences between the responses of the African American and Caucasian offenders on the SAQ scales. These results support previous findings regarding the reliability and validity of the SAQ for assessing recidivism and institutional adjustment and suggest that the SAQ could be used with diverse populations.

Too Proud to Let Go: Narcissistic Entitlement as a Barrier to Forgiveness.

Narcissistic entitlement impedes forgiveness in ways not captured by other robust predictors (e.g., offense severity, apology, relationship closeness, religiosity, Big Five personality factors), as demonstrated in 6 studies. Narcissistic entitlement involves expectations of special treatment and preoccupation with defending one's rights. In Study 1, entitlement predicted less forgiveness and greater insistence on repayment for a past offense. Complementary results emerged from Study 2, which used hypothetical transgressions, and Study 3, which assessed broad forgiveness dispositions. Study 4 examined associations with the Big Five, and Study 5 extended the findings to a laboratory context. Study 6 demonstrated that entitlement predicted diminished increases in forgiveness over time. Taken together, these results suggest that narcissistic entitlement is a robust, distinct predictor of unforgiveness.

Criminal Law Scholarship: Three Illusions

The paper criticizes law scholarship for helping to construct and failing to expose analytic structures that falsely claim a higher level of rationality and coherence than current law theory deserves. It offers illustrations of three such illusions of rationality. First, it is common in law discourse for scholars and judges to cite any of standard litany of the purposes of - just deserts, deterrence, incapacitation of dangerous, rehabilitation, and sometimes other purposes - as a justification for one or another liability rule or sentencing practice. The cited gives rules an aura of rationality, but one that is, in large part, illusory. Without a principle defining interrelation of purposes, nearly any rule can be justified by some purpose of punishment. Thus, a decision maker can switch among distributive principles as needed to provide an apparent rationale for whichever rule person prefers, even if that preference is not based on rational criteria. A second example is found in a central mechanism for determining an offender's blameworthiness: use of an individualized objective standard. The widely used mechanism avoids problems acknowledged to attend a strictly objective standard. A person's situation and capacities are central to an assessment of whether a person can be fairly blamed for a violation, and individualized objective standard allows decision maker to take these into account. At same time, mechanism avoids reversion to a completely subjective standard, which might exempt many blameworthy cases from liability. In reality, however, mechanism only shifts form of problem. Codes that use individualized objective standard fail to provide a principle by which one can determine those characteristics of an offender with which objective standard ought to be individualized and those with which it ought not. Without a governing principle, issue again is left to discretion of decision makers, with no guidance as to how that discretion is to be exercised. A final illusion obscures whether system is, in fact, in business of doing justice. The criminal justice system imposes punishment and encourages moral condemnation of those found guilty of crimes. But while system cultivates its doing-justice image, it increasingly shifts to a system of essentially preventive detention, where a violator's sanction is derived more from what is needed to incapacitate him from committing future offenses than to punish him for a past offense. There are great advantages to deception, but also serious costs and inefficiencies. The paper discusses why some illusions are more objectionable than others and what existence of such illusions says about modern law scholarship.

The spiritual needs of the dying patient.

“. . . The American people want to reclaim and reassert the spiritual dimension in dying.” This was the major conclusion of a recent survey of 1,200 adults, 18 years or older, conducted in the United States during May 1997 (and completed before the June 1997 Supreme Court decision on physician-assisted suicide). Spirituality has been defined as “. . . that which allows a person to experience transcendent meaning in life. This is often expressed as a relationship with God, but it can also be about nature, art, music, family, or community—whatever beliefs and values give a person a sense of meaning and purpose in life.” So, every person, regardless of any commitment to a particular religious faith, has a real spirituality inasmuch as one experiences meaning and purpose in life. It is the real and immediate threat to this sense of meaning in the face of terminal illness that creates the spiritual distress of the dying. This article will expand on previous material presented in this series. It will explore the nature of suffering and its relationship to spiritual distress, identify ways that caregivers can address the spiritual distress of their patients, and examine the potential for healing in the terminally ill. The intent of this article is to help establish common ground in the midst of great diversity of faith and culture to facilitate dialogue and understanding between patient and caregiver as spiritual issues are addressed at the end of life. An inherent conflict exists between the technique (including technology) of medicine, which is problemfocused and reductionist by nature, and the spiritual needs of the dying, which are rooted in mystery. “Death is the edge of a mystery, and turning our faces toward the problematic, through the persistent use of technology, at the hour of death keeps us from having to face mystery. Death is no problem to be solved; it resists any such formulation . . . By keeping our attention on end-of-life problems, we ignore the mystery of the end of life.” Addressing the problems of the dying without caring for the person who is dying can cause suffering. At the heart of the spiritual distress of the dying is suffering. Eric Cassel has defined suffering as “. . . the state of severe distress associated with events that threaten the intactness of the person.” By its very nature, “suffering is experienced by persons. Suffering occurs when an impending destruction of the person is perceived; it continues until the threat of disintegration has passed or until the integrity of the person can be restored in some other manner.” Indeed, the challenge at the end of life is to restore and maintain the integrity of the dying person in the face of a clear and ever present threat of disintegration. Suffering affects persons in all their complexity. “. . . Suffering can occur in relation to any aspect of the person, whether it is in the realm of social roles, group identification, the relation with self, body, or family, or the relation with a transpersonal, transcendent source of meaning.” Another way to express the all encompassing nature of suffering is the concept of “total pain” articulated by Dame Cicely Saunders, the founder of the modern hospice movement. The four domains of pain that in their totality constitute “total pain” or suffering are: physical pain (and other distressing physical symptoms); psychologic or emotional pain (eg, symptoms of anxiety and depression); social pain (eg, fear of separation from loved ones, broken relationships); and spiritual pain. Many of the major spiritual concerns that Americans have about death were identified in the May 1997 Gallup survey. These include: fears of not being forgiven by God (56%), not being reconciled with others (56%), dying while being cut off or removed from God or a higher power (51%), not being forgiven by someone for a past offense (49%), not having a blessing from a family member or clergy member (39%), and concerns about the nature of the experience after death (39%). Dr Cassel has also observed that if the caregiver doesn’t recognize or diagnose suffering, he cannot relieve it. Because suffering affects persons, the standard objective measures used to diagnose diseases will not be helpful. Typically, suffering involves symptoms that threaten the integrity of the patient as a person. The meaning that Received June 4, 2002; Accepted June 4, 2002. From the Department of Surgery and Palliative Care Program, VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, and University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI. Correspondence address: Daniel B Hinshaw, MD, FACS, VAMC (112), 2215 Fuller Rd, Ann Arbor, MI 48105.

Contested Portrayals: Medical and Legal Social Control of Juvenile Sex Offenders

While juvenile courts were originally designed to respond to troubled youth by providing treatment appropriate to the needs of individual offenders, advocates of a system that “gets tough” on young criminals by meting out punishments based on offense characteristics (both present offense and past offense history) have become increasingly influential in recent years. In this article, I examine a special case, that of juvenile sex offenders in a Washington State county, for whom a 1990 law reintroduced treatment as a central goal. While Washington has been a forerunner in the shift toward a juvenile justice system in which offending behavior is the central factor in decision making, I argue that, largely as a result of this law, juvenile sex offending has been “medicalized” and that, in this process, distinctions based on offense characteristics have noticeably diminished. This case study provides both empirical support for established theoretical arguments regarding medicalization and a detailed explication of the differences between medical and legal assumptions about social problems.

Criminal Law Scholarship: Three Illusions

The paper criticizes criminal law scholarship for helping to construct and failing to expose analytic structures that falsely claim a higher level of rationality and coherence than current criminal law theory deserves. It offers illustrations of three such illusions of rationality. First, it is common in criminal law discourse for scholars and judges to cite any of the standard litany of "the purposes of punishment" -- just deserts, deterrence, incapacitation of the dangerous, rehabilitation, and sometimes other purposes -- as a justification for one or another liability rule or sentencing practice. The cited "purpose" gives the rules an aura of rationality, but one that is, in large part, illusory. Without a principle defining the interrelation of the "purposes," nearly any rule can be justified by some "purpose of punishment." Thus, a decision maker can switch among distributive principles as needed to provide an apparent rationale for whichever rule the person prefers, even if that preference is not based on rational criteria. A second example is found in a central mechanism for determining an offenderâs blameworthiness: the use of an individualized objective standard. The widely used mechanism avoids the problems acknowledged to attend a strictly objective standard. A person's situation and capacities are central to an assessment of whether a person can be fairly blamed for a violation, and the individualized objective standard allows the decision maker to take these into account. At the same time, the mechanism avoids reversion to a completely subjective standard, which might exempt many blameworthy cases from liability. In reality, however, the mechanism only shifts the form of the problem. Codes that use the individualized objective standard fail to provide a principle by which one can determine those characteristics of an offender with which the objective standard ought to be individualized and those with which it ought not. Without a governing principle, the issue again is left to the discretion of decision makers, with no guidance as to how that discretion is to be exercised. A final illusion obscures whether the criminal justice system is, in fact, in the business of "doing justice." The "criminal justice" system imposes "punishment" and encourages moral condemnation of those found "guilty" of "crimes." But while the system cultivates its doing-justice image, it increasingly shifts to a system of essentially preventive detention, where a violator's sanction is derived more from what is needed to incapacitate him from committing future offenses than to punish him for a past offense. There are great advantages to the deception, but also serious costs and inefficiencies. The paper discusses why some illusions are more objectionable than others and what the existence of such illusions says about modern criminal law scholarship.

Psychopathy and sexual assault: static risk factors, emotional precursors, and rapist subtypes.

This study compared psychopathic and nonpsychopathic rapists on static risk factors and on emotional and motivational precursors. Sixty incarcerated rapists were assessed for psychopathy with the Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (R. D. Hare, 1991), and they were classified according to the Massachusetts Treatment Center: Revised Rapist Typology, Version 3 (R. A. Knight & R. A. Prentky, 1990b). Psychopathy was positively associated with past nonsexual offenses and negatively associated with age onset for criminal offending, number of sexual victims, and the intensity of negative emotions experienced before sexual offending. However, psychopathy was not related to sexual offense history, age of onset for sexual offending, or victim harm. Last, psychopaths were most likely to be classified as opportunistic and pervasively angry rapists. The findings indicate that psychopathy should be considered when developing intervention strategies for rapists.