NCJ Number
156398
Journal
Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health Volume: 3 Issue: 4 Dated: (1993) Pages: 381-392
Date Published
1993
Length
12 pages
Annotation
The basis of sexual psychopathy legislation in the United States is that some offenders need to be dealt with differently from others because of their sexual dangerousness.
Abstract
These offenders are sent to hospitals or prisons where they receive treatment while detained over an indefinite period. Although sexual psychopathy laws have existed for more than 50 years, their effects are only recently being evaluated in a few States. Enactment, amendment, and repeal of such laws have occurred in the absence of empirical support, and clinical issues have become subsumed in legal debate. Institutions to which sexual psychopaths are sent, whether hospitals or prisons, invariably get caught in the legal crossfire. The authors examine some of the issues surrounding sexual psychopathy laws that focus on sexual psychopathy as a diagnostic entity and ethical considerations. They conclude that costs of sexual aggression need to be calculated beyond the simplistic economics of imprisonment versus treatment. 25 references