Fraud, deception, and thieves
David V. James
Introduction
Dishonesty and deception are mundane and ubiquitous elements of human behaviour. Various forms are also categorized as criminal offences in the codes or statutes of all organized societies. In criminological terms, fraud, deception, and theft are forms of stealing, in other words dishonestly depriving others of goods or services. However, deception and fraudulent misrepresentation play a much wider role in human behaviour and interactions. This chapter will first consider briefly the broader picture, before considering in detail psychiatric aspects of stealing.
Fraud and deception
It is a common tendency to distort memory or reality through the lens of wishful thinking. To deny, to lie to others, and to engage in self-deception is part of the human condition. At one level, this can amount to innocuous forms of self-distraction, such as daydreaming or the childhood world of make-belief. Both blend the borders between fantasy and reality. Deception, which more bluntly put means lying, is on the other hand instrumental in purpose. The essential elements of lying are a conscious awareness of falsity, the intent to deceive and a pre-conceived goal or purpose. In some walks of life, such as advertising or politics, it may be part of the job, at least when the individual thinks that they can get away with it. Deception of others may slide into self-deception, the editing of memory to suit current desires. This may concern a wide range of life’s extravagancies, from the fraudulent endeavours of the narcissistic fantasist to the imperatives of those who convince themselves, or wish to convince others, of their own supposed illnesses or infirmities. Particular forms of fraud, deception, and self-deception relevant to the medical context are factitious disorder, malingering, and pathological lying: these are dealt with in Chapter 5.2.9.
Theft
Types
Categorization of offences differs between jurisdictions. However, that for England and Wales forms a basic, illustrative framework. Offences are categorized under the Theft Act 1968 into theft, burglary, vehicle offences, and deception. The Theft Act 1978 further clarifies the area of deception (dishonestly obtaining services from another), dividing it into evading liabilities and debts, and making off without payment. The Fraud Act 2006 provides for a general offence of fraud with three ways in which it can be committed—by false representation, by failing to disclose information, and by abuse of position.
Rates/prevalence
Rates of criminal theft, fraud, and deception can be examined in terms of offences committed per unit of population. In England and Wales, with a population of 53.3 million, the number of reported fraud, theft, and deception offences in 2006 was 2 789 600, which equates to approxi mately 5.2 per 1 000 total population. These comprised 51 per cent of all crimes reported to the police.(1) However, crime is under-reported to the police and it is notable that the rate of offending as recorded by population survey in England and Wales is generally more than double. International comparisons of crime figures are hampered by differences in classification, measures, and time period.
A motivational classification of theft
Theft and dishonesty may arise from a range of motives. There is no necessity to invoke mental disorder in order to explain thieving. However, a minority of cases are related to serious mental disorder, such as mania, schizophrenia, depression, and organic brain disorder; and other forms of abnormal psychological processes can act as drivers for criminally dishonest behaviour. These go beyond the formal classification of such behaviours in, for instance, the DSM-IV-TR,(2) where these appear only in the specific syndrome of kleptomania and as a component of the definitions of conduct disorder and anti-social personality disorder.
The following classification is not exhaustive and the categories not mutually exclusive. The great majority of thefts will fit into the first two categories, and it is the remainder that are more likely to form part of a presentation to a psychiatrist.
(a) Ordinary theft
Ordinary theft may be planned or impulsive, but is deliberate and motivated by the usefulness of the object or its monetary value.
1 Professional—crime as a career choice.
2 Delinquent—theft as one component of a delinquent or antisocial lifestyle.
3 Survival offences—driven by poverty, desperation, or necessity.
(b) Emotionally driven theft
Emotionally driven theft is the consequence of emotion, rather than as a means of financial gain.
4 Anger or revenge—based upon depriving someone else, rather than personally acquiring.
5 Fear—coerced into committing an offence by threats from a third party.
6 Excitement—this can be as part of a dare or a rite of passage, particularly in adolescents.
(c) Secondary theft
Secondary theft is attributable to the presence of an underlying disorder.
(i) Pecuniary
7 To fund addictive behaviour—e.g. alcohol dependence, drug addiction, pathological gambling.
(ii) Non-pecuniary
8 Depressed stealing:
cry for help (attention-seeking behaviour): stealing in a way that is sure to be detected in order to obtain support and other help.
suicidal gesture: a depressed persons may steal articles of which they have no need, the action serving as a justification for feelings of guilt and a form of suicidal equivalent.
substitution: the stolen object compensates for something else. For example a rejected wife might steal from her husband in order symbolically to establish a degree of control and compensate for the loss of affection.
distraction: e.g. ‘absent-mindedness’ in a shop as a consequence of distraction by depressive ruminations, or distress in the context of bereavement or divorce.
9 Manic stealing: stealing in the context of manic disinhibition or delusion.
10 Psychotic: the result of delusional drive or command hallucinations.
11 Confusion: related to cognitive deficit, as a consequence of organic brain disorder, or to dissociative states.
12 ‘Kleptomania’: compulsive stealing as an impulse-control disorder.
Management
A psychiatrist will only have a role in the management of theft cases where a particular psychiatric or psychological issue is central. The management will depend upon the nature of the underlying disorder. Treatment for the primary disorder will, in most cases, be supplemented by a psychological approach to helping the patient understand the reasons for their offending behaviour, recognize triggers or danger points, and develop strategies for dealing with these in the future.
Kleptomania constitutes a particular diagnostic entity, and shoplifting is a common behaviour which not uncommonly leads to requests for psychiatric reports from the courts. Both will be considered in more detail below.
Kleptomania
Definition
Kleptomania is an old term, first used by Marc and Esquirol in 1838 to indicate a ‘stealing madness’. Kleptomania was designated a psychiatric disorder in DSM-III in 1980, and, in DSM-IIIR in 1987, it was grouped under the category ‘impulse control disorder, not elsewhere classified’. The disorder is described further in Chapter 4.13.1 (Impulse Control Disorders) and only aspects most relevant to forensic practice are considered here.
The core characteristic is that objects are stolen despite the fact that they are typically of little value to the individual, who could have afforded to pay for them. Sometimes, they are hoarded and sometimes dispensed with or returned. DSM-IV-TR describes the essential features of the disorder in five diagnostic criteria (312.33):
‘Recurrent failure to resist impulses to steal objects that are not needed for personal use or for their monetary value.
Increasing sense of tension immediately before committing the theft.
Pleasure, gratification, or relief at the time of committing the theft.
The stealing is not committed to express anger or revenge and is not in response to a delusion or a hallucination.
The stealing is not better accounted for by conduct disorder, a manic episode, or anti-social personality disorder’.
In addition, individuals with kleptomania ‘experience the impulse to steal as ego-dystonic and are aware that the act is wrong and senseless’.
Diagnostic problems
Criterion A, which concerns the senselessness of the theft, is often considered to be the characteristic which separates kleptomania from ordinary theft. However, some kleptomaniacs may desire the items and be able to use them, even if they are not strictly needed: this may be particularly the case with those who hoard.(3) Concerning criteria B and C, some patients report amnesia surrounding the time of the theft and therefore deny feelings or tension immediately beforehand or relief at the time of committing the theft.(3,4) There is also some suggestion that kleptomaniacs who repeatedly steal over long periods eventually lose the feelings of tension and pleasure in a behaviour which has simply become a habit.
Related posts:
Stay updated, free articles. Join our Telegram channel
Full access? Get Clinical Tree
