The Mind of a Murderer: A glimpse into the darkest corners of the human psyche, from a leading forensic psychiatrist

Product Information

So there's nothing…I think this chapter in my book, some readers have said they had to read it with their eyes closed because these are not easy, not easy cases to digest.

Harris Distinguished Service Professor in Psychology and Psychiatry at UChicago, noting differences in the orbitofrontal cortex and anterior temporal lobes of the brain. In "The Mind of a Murderer," Ward goes behind bars to interview violent killers and offer insight into what drives people to commit heinous acts. In this fascinating memoir, Taylor draws on some of the most tragic, horrific and illuminating of these cases - as well as dark secrets from his own family's past - to explore some of the questions he grapples with every day: Why do people kill? Harold’s story is not entirely true, but a similar case took place in the US with a man’s offensive behaviour subsiding after a brain tumour was removed – twice. Sana Qadar: One such case Dr Taylor breaks down in his book involves a man he's dubbed Jonathan Brooks.Rich Haridy in the ‘New Atlas’ puts it rather clearly: if we start to ascribe criminal behaviour to brain function beyond our control, why shouldn’t we do the same with altruistic actions and selfless behaviour? Richard Taylor: I think, as everyone's aware, the biggest group of murders is young men killing other young men who they may or may not know. So the way the way the law works in the UK is you get a partial defence to murder, so you don't completely lose responsibility, you get diminished responsibility. Alongside these captivating stories, psychology books and famous experiments in psychology have also piqued the interest of many, leading to a growing number of people eager to delve into the enigmatic world of criminal minds.

Sana Qadar: This was a self-inflicted wound, but now as a forensic psychiatrist, Dr Taylor deals with the harms people inflict on others.

It was only when their daughter appeared to be tearful and dishevelled at school that teachers made a referral to social services and the full story emerged.

Taylor had assessed Hardy after a sex worker was found dead, supposedly of a heart attack, in his flat in 2002; Hardy went on to kill and dismember two more sex workers. But while this idea – that his mother had been replaced by an imposter – matched his reality, it was out of kilter with everyone else’s. The obvious problem with this approach is that, some years from now, we might look back and squint at the number of potential patients who were instead convicted and imprisoned as criminals.They present the child to doctors with an apparent illness, which is later discovered to have been induced by the caregiver through false reporting of symptoms, or by inflicting injuries on or poisoning the child.