Thomas Stompe - From Delusion to Crime

Ill and evil: how the mentally disturbed can become criminals

Anders Brevik, Josef Fritzl, or the ‘Ice Lady’– are criminals like these pure evil or are they in fact mentally ill? Why is a fanatic legally accountable, while someone delusional is not? Is one innocent and the other guilty? Forensic psychiatrist Thomas Stompe works with ‘mentally disturbed offenders’ who are not held in regular prison, but detained in mental health facilities with special security measures. He recounts fascinating details from cases he has encountered in his work practice as a therapist: the motives that drive the ill offenders; their delusions and crimes; their treatment and their lives ‘after the act’. The stories are disturbing, yet also provoke compassion for the offenders who are humans like you and I.