Jeffrey Dahmer, one of the most notorious serial killers in American history, shocked the world with the gruesome nature of his crimes. As the details of his heinous acts unfolded, many wondered about the psychological factors contributing to his deviant behavior. This article will examine Jeffrey Dahmer’s mental health and explore his illnesses and disorders.
Jeffrey Dahmer Illness
Forensic psychiatrists investigated the specifics of his victims to decide whether Jeffrey Dahmer belonged in prison or a mental institution. Dahmer would be eligible for parole from a mental facility every six months.
Dahmer enticed men into his home for nearly a decade by offering to take their naked pictures in exchange for money. Dahmer would poison their drink, knock them out, and then drill a hole in the top of their heads, filling it with acid.
A companion of sorts, he tried to make “living zombies,” but “it never worked.” Dahmer confessed to the murders and dismemberment of the men in 60 hours of recorded testimony released by the police.
While his initial motivation for cannibalism was “curiosity,” he later claimed that he craved his victims so much because he wanted a piece of them to become a permanent part of his body.
Forensic psychiatrists concluded that Dahmer had psychopathy or an antisocial personality disorder based on the evidence and specifics of the murders.
Dr. Park Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist, told The New York Times 1991 that patients with borderline personality disorder exhibit “that intense fear of abandonment and intolerance of being alone.”
People afraid of abandonment may become angry when the person they want to be with is about to leave. Necrophilia, or the urge to have s*x with corpses, was cited by the defense as evidence that Dahmer had a mental condition.
According to Wisconsin state law, a judge determined that necrophilia is a personality disorder rather than a mental condition. In her testimony on behalf of the defense, University of Arizona psychologist Judith Becker said that Dahmer “has a mental disease and that’s what drives his crime.”
Why Was Jeffrey Dahmer Known as a Psychopath?
According to investigators, Dahmer apparently experienced multiple instances of feeling abandoned throughout his childhood. On his report card, his teachers noted that he had expressed concerns about feeling “neglected” due to his mother’s illness.
After being apprehended, Dahmer admitted to the police that his parents had divorced and left him home alone. At the time, his father had left the house, and he was a senior in high school.
Dahmer claimed that this left him feeling entirely alone. His mother later relocated to Wisconsin to live with his younger brother. Shortly after moving in with his grandmother, Dahmer convinced hitchhiker Steven Hicks to come to his house to share a few beers.
However, Dahmer told authorities that when Hicks signaled that it was time to depart, he became enraged, hit him with a dumbbell, and strangled him. With each of the 15 killings, this fury flared up again, and his inability to deal with them leaving and his fear of being alone drove him to ki!! Them.
He wanted them to become “living zombies” so they would constantly be with him. A homicide detective’s report on Dahmer quotes him as saying, “It was better to have them with him dead than to have them leave.”
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Did Jeffrey Dahmer’s Mental Illness Lead to His Cannibalism?
A detective’s assessment was that Dahmer’s fear of desertion motivated him to engage in cannibalism. Dahmer initially claimed to have been “curious” when he decided to cannibalize one of his victims, telling officials that was all.
In 1993, Dahmer admitted to Inside Edition that he had “these obsessive desires to wanting to control them… possess them permanently.”
Eric Hickley, MD, claims a forensic psychologist, cannibals frequently experience extreme insecurity and cannot maintain healthy relationships. Since their victims cannot escape, eating them gives them a sense of power.
He claimed that most of their victims pass away quickly. “They’re not interested in their victim suffering like Ted Bundy was,” he claimed. But Hickley noted that Dahmer and other cannibals “They’re not looking for sadism. They simply want access to the body.”
Despite forensic psychiatrists’ testimony, a jury found Dahmer was competent to stand trial and did not have a recognized mental disorder. Dahmer is “very sick,” but he is not legally crazy, according to court-appointed psychiatrist Dr. George Palermo, who testified in front of the court.
Only two of the 12 men and women who participated in the jury’s decision about Dahmer’s mental state at the time of the murder agreed that he was mad.
The majority of the jury, which is required by law to reach a unanimous decision, determined that Dahmer did not have a mental disorder that rendered him incapable of understanding the wrongness of his actions.
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