Friends of the Forensic Science Club, this week we present the paper “Crimes and sentences in individuals with intellectual disability in a forensic psychiatric context: a register-based study”, by Edberg, H.; Chen, Q.; Andiné, P.; Larsson, H. and Hirvikoski, T. (2022), in which authors carry out a study to know what are the crimes committed by people with intellectual disabilities and their comparison with the ones committed by people with a typical intellectual development. 

People with intellectual disabilities who commit crimes have a judicial status, characteristics and needs that concern most of the developed countries.

These people are an important group, but still small and not well recognized. The prevalence of diagnosed intellectual disability (hereinafter ID) in the general population is approximately 1%, and those who commit criminal offenses make up a small number of that percentage.

Whether or not people with ID are at increased risk of committing crimes is unclear based on the current literature. There are experts who support the idea and others who don’t, since it has not been confirmed.

In recent years, several patterns have been proposed regarding the typology of crimes committed by people with ID. Several studies have pointed to an increased risk of sexually inappropriate behavior and, therefore, of sexual offenses.

This generalization, however, needs to be studied, as the samples used for these studies have been small and the proposed definitions of intellectual disability inconsistent.

Most developed countries have criminal legislation in which offenders will not be responsible for their crimes if they suffer from some type of mental pathology, and under certain conditions. They are considered, for example, unable to stand trial, or not guilty by reason of insanity.

Meeting the special needs of these people, providing them with adequate rehabilitation and combining this with public safety, is a complicated task for which a plurality of options is needed. Authors argue that neither prison nor hospital orders are ideal. Community sanctions and other measures, defined as non-prison sentences, such as probation, have steadily increased in European countries. However, the prevalence of people with ID in prison systems is approximately 2-10%.

Sweden considers that offenders with serious mental disorders can be held responsible for their actions. However, the court may order a pre-trial forensic psychiatric evaluation to decide whether an offender suffers from a severe mental disorder, thus sentencing the offender to forensic psychiatric care rather than prison.

The main objective of this study was to study the typology of crimes in people with ID and without ID who were subject to a pre-trial forensic psychiatric evaluation, in the Swedish context. 

The study was observational and based on records of all persons undergoing forensic psychiatric evaluation in Sweden from January 1st, 1997, to May 30th, 2013. The final study population was 7,450 individuals.

Crimes were classified into four categories: sexual crimes, violent crimes, non-sexual violent crimes, and non-sexual non-violent crimes.

Sex crimes included rape, sexual coercion, child abuse, indecent exposure, sexual harassment, child pornography, among others.

Violent crimes included homicide, assault, robbery, arson, unlawful threats, or intimidation….

Non-sexual violent crimes excluded all sexual crimes from the category of violent crimes.

Finally, non-violent non-sexual crimes included all those that did not fit into the previous categories.

The results indicated that sexual offenses were more common among people with ID than without ID. 26% of ID offenders had committed a sexual offense, compared to 15% in the non-ID group. Violent crimes were equally frequent among both groups.

Several explanations for these data have been proposed. For example, the lack of knowledge and sexual education. It has been shown that people with ID have lower levels of sexual knowledge than their peers without ID, raising the issue of sex education as a preventive measure for this type of crime.

On the other hand, the modeling hypothesis appears as a result of previous sexual abuse. It arises from the idea that prior victimization is a common circumstance among sexual aggressors, moreover, people with ID are at greater risk of being victims of this type of crime.

There is also a lack of social integration, closely related to the idea that sex offenders in general may lack a prosocial identity.

Authors propose investing resources and time in structured and specialized treatment programs for these people, in addition to investigating the forms of rehabilitation and habilitation of forensic psychiatric care that they receive.

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