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I suspect there are some people who don't think this is a serious crime, the serial killing of pet cats allegedly by Florida teen Tyler Hayes Weinman, 18. However, mental health professionals and researchers have long associated cruelty to animals with antisocial personality disorder. This disorder should never be taken lightly. If you have a child who is cruel to your pets or others' pets and animals, you may be nurturing a sociopath or psychopath.
To give you an idea of the level of cruelty of Weinman's alleged deeds, here's a quote from CNN.
Pet owners and police began discovering disfigured cats May 13. One pet owner, Donna Gleason, said her family cat, Tommy, was "partially skinned" and left dead in her yard. ... Weinman, who works odd jobs but spends most of his time at home and unemployed, had been a person of interest for several weeks, Miller said. He was arrested Saturday.(CNN)
National Institutes of Health states, "Fire-setting and cruelty to animals during childhood are linked to the development of antisocial personality." At 18, Weinman is long past childhood and if he committed this crime, this is probably not the first time he's done something like this, but this is the time he got caught.
Blogger Peggy Rowland at BlissTree shares this picture of Weinman and asks, "What does an accused serial cat killer look like?" She continues, writing, "If the teen ... were standing beside me at a Ben & Jerry’s, I certainly would never guess… cat killer."
People who have antisocial personality disorder can look like anyone, and frequently they are also charming. Remember serial killer Ted Bundy, described as good-looking? He's often considered a perfect example of the sociopath, which is the word we used to give to people who lacked conscience before the mental health community switched to antisocial personality disorder. Bundy killed women, but a thief like Bernie Madoff may also be a sociopath. They're people who don't care about anyone other than themselves.
BitterQueen at Friends of Ours connects the dots from cruelty to animals to serial killers:
In all seriousness, if the allegations against Weinman are true, then obviously he's a very disturbed boy. Anyone who discounts the seriousness of animal cruelty charges, keep in mind that a lot of serial killers and other psychopaths got their start with animals. (Bitter Queen)
Antisocial personality disorder, as suggested earlier, is associated with a lack of guilt or remorse. Harming animals may only be a temporary power fix along the way. While people who have the more severe forms of antisocial disorder may not always escalate to harming people, under circumstances that they feel it's in their better interest, for instance to get money or to not be caught, they will kill humans. But again, their crimes are not necessarily violent. A CEO who raids a company, knowing people will lose their life savings or a con artist who takes money through guile, not caring what happens to his vicitms, is also a sociopath, which is why I mentioned Madoff earlier.
Weinman needs, help, you most likely think. Sadly, there may be no help because there is no known effective treatment for the disorder, but as people who live by hope, we always look for solutions. Here are some of the symptoms or signs of a person with this disorder, according to NIH literature: A person with antisocial personality disorder: People with antisocial personality disorder may have the following signs:
Lying is on the list of symptoms. What that means is repeated lying often for no obvious reason like avoiding punishment or to get out of chores. It means lying sometimes for the sake of lying or to see how people react to the lie, if they can get away with it.
As one psychologist has said antisocial personality disorder is more about acts of cruelty and manipulation than craziness. The person is what some of us would call mean, lacking a conscience. Think of the cruelty it takes to kill a small animal, especially the cruelty to steal a pet from a family and kill it.
I remember when I heard Michael Vick's dogfighting and drowning dogs.
