Females & Crime
Introduction
• Feminist criminology challenged the
traditionally masculine view by pointing
out two important factors:
1. female crime is virtually
ignored/overlooked
2. female victimization is ignored,
minimized, or trivialized
• For the most part, females who are in the
criminal justice system are ordinary individuals
who have engaged in sporadic/unskilled crimes
• Over 60% of incarcerated women report being
physically or sexually assaulted at some point in
their lives
• Approximately 1/3 of those report that they
were assaulted by a family member, relative, or
intimate acquaintance
• 1/5 female inmates spent time in foster
care
• Over 50% grew up in homes without both
parents present
• 34% of the parents who were present
abused alcohol and/or drugs
Selected Topics
1. Munchausen Syndrome
2. Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy
3. Female Serial Killers
Munchausen Syndrome
• intentionally exaggerated, feigned,
simulated, aggravated, or self-induced an
illness or injury for the primary purpose
of attention and nurturing
• Factitious disorder in the DSM-IV-TR
Factitious Disorder
(1) intentional production or feigning of physical
or psychological signs or symptoms,
(2) motivation for the behaviour is to assume the
sick role, and
(3) absence of external incentives for the
behaviour (e.g., economic gain, avoiding legal
responsibility, improving physical well-being,
as in malingering)
Factitious Disorder
(1) factitious disorder with predominantly
psychological signs and symptoms,
(2) factitious disorder with predominantly
physical signs and symptoms, and
(3) factitious disorder with combined
psychological and physical signs and
symptoms
Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy
•intentional production or feigning of physical or
psychological signs or symptoms in another
person
•motivation is to assume the sick role by proxy
•incentives for the behaviours (such as economic
gain) are absent
•behaviour is not better accounted for by another
mental disorder
Prevalence
• United States:
– Fever: 9.3% had factitious disorder
– Kidney stones: 2.6% was found to be nonphysiologic
and probably fraudulent
• International
– Consultation-liaison service: 0.8% (10 of 1288) had
factitious disorder (Toronto)
– Infants with serious illnesses: 1.5% were cases of
factitious disorder by proxy (Australia)
– Physicians surveyed estimate: 1.3% (Germany)
Sex
• Persons with factitious disorder are usually female (95%) and
employed in medical fields such as nursing or medical
technology
• Working in the medical field provides knowledge of how
disease might be produced artificially and provides access to
equipment (e.g., syringes, chemicals) with which to do so
• Persons with chronic factitious disorder (i.e., Munchausen
syndrome) tend to be unmarried men who are estranged
from their families
• Perpetrators of factitious disorder by proxy are typically
mothers who induce illness in their young children; however,
sometimes fathers or others are responsible
Age
• Persons with factitious disorder tend to
be women aged 20-40 years
• Persons with chronic factitious disorder
(i.e., Munchausen syndrome) tend to be
middle-aged men
• Factitious disorder has been noted in the
paediatric population
Etiology
• The causes are not well defined
• One psychodynamic explanation: background of neglect
or abandonment, are attempting to re-enact
unconscious and unresolved early issues with parents
• Other possible explanations:
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Underlying masochistic tendencies
A need to be the center of attention and to feel important
A need to assume a dependent status and receive nurturance
A need to ease feelings of worthlessness or vulnerability
A need to feel superior to authority figures (e.g., the physician)
that is gratified by being able to deceive the physician
Etiology
• factitious disorder by proxy: the parent is using
the children to meet these needs
• alternatively, vicarious satisfaction of attention
and nurturance needs that may be missing from
her marriage
• the behaviour stems from narcissism,
sociopathy, and the desire to manipulate
authority figures
Marybeth Tinning
From 1972 to 1985, she lost nine children:
1. Jennifer, 8 days old: meningitis
2. Three weeks later, 2 year old Joseph: DOA; viral infection &
seizure disorder
3. Six weeks later, 4 year old Barbara: cardiac arrest
4. The next year, 3 week old Timothy: SIDS
5. Two years later, 5 month old Nathan: DOA; pulmonary edema
6. Four years later, 2 ½ year old Mary: SIDS
7. The next year, 3 month old Jonathan: no cause determined
8. The next year, adopted 3 year old Timothy: bronchial
pneumonia
9. 4 years later, 3 month old Tami Lynne: SIDS
Female Serial Killers
Female Serial Killers
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Long killing sprees
Less violent
Money and materialistic tendencies
Attention seeking behaviour, cult, sex,
need to overpower, personality disorders
• People close to them
• M. D. Kelleher & C. L. Kelleher (1998):
100 female serial killing cases;
classification into nine categories
1.Angel of Death
• She can be seen in the role of medical caretaker, nurse,
midwife, home aide, doctor, etc.
• Angel of death usually preys on the sick, vulnerable or
invalid in order to fulfill the desires of control and
domination.
• e.g., Genene Jones, while working as a pediatric nurse,
is believed to have killed between 11 and 46 infants
and children in her care
2.Black Widow
• A black widow murders for greed. Her husband,
children or other family member become
sacrificial to her lust for money. They are
generally seen to kill for inheritance or for
collecting life insurance.
• e.g., Lydia Catherine Ambrose killed five
husbands and lovers for their insurance money.
3.Sexual Predator
• A female serial killer in the role of sexual
predator is a rarity, especially with out a
partner. But recently new cases have
come up which would shed more light on
female sexual predator behaviour.
• e.g., Aileen Wuornos
4.Avenger
• She lashes out at all those who have
thwarted her in her gains. Deep seated
anger, desire for revenge drives this
woman to commit mass murders.
• e.g., Aileen Wuornos
5.Partner in Crime
• Crime teams are not unheard of and malefemale partnership for serial killing is also not
that uncommon. They often commit crimes of
sexual nature where the male accomplices
mostly dominate their female partners.
• e.g., Karla Homolka helped Paul Bernardo
subdue and rape victims — even her own sister
— and was believed to have participated in
several of the murders of young women for
which the pair were convicted
6.Profit or Crime
• Profit killers, again, are a rarity. They are
considered as bright and resourceful
without any conscience. They are
sociopaths who are ready to kill just to
get their way in the world.
• e.g., Madame Popova
7.Question of Sanity
• Delusions, paranoia, schizophrenia and
other mental disorders
• e.g., Andrea Yates: drowned her five
children in a bathtub while suffering
postpartum depression and severe
psychosis after recent childbirth
8.Unexplained
• Killings by a woman in a random and
unapparent manner which baffles the law
enforcement, particularly where the
motives remain obscure and inexplicable.
• e.g., Christine Falling
9.Unsolved
• The unsolved crimes which are believed
to be the work of a woman.
• e.g., Edith Bingham?
Characteristics Summary
• Kill for money and other gains
• Often takes twice as long to catch a
female serial killer
• Keep a low profile and often kill people
who are close to them
• Target vulnerable victims
• Angel of death killers often diagnosed
with Munchausen Syndrome or
Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy
Sex Differences Summary
• males regularly stalk strangers, females largely tend to slay those
close to them intimately
• males tend to be physical (shoot, stab, batter and strangle);
women most often use poison
• Male motive is half the time sexually driven; Female motives:
profit (75 percent), control (13 percent) or revenge (12 percent)
•
• a male's killing spree: several months to four years; like female
activities average, from six to eight years (some have gone
undetected for three decades)
• three common denominators:
– an ability to portray a surface normality when it is necessary for
planning and survival purposes
– psychopaths (not insane)
– as psychopaths they lack a conscience
Representative Examples
Countess Elizabeth Báthory de Ecsed
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Hungary 1590 – 1610
Tortured, burned, froze to death
(over 600 girls and young women)
earlier victims were the servant girls
of Csejte Castle, where she lived with
her husband
after her husband's death, she got a
free rein to torture and kill women
with the help of her four faithful
servants
believed to bathe in the blood of
young women in pursuit of eternal
beauty
rumours started to spread and
eventually, some of her intended
victims escaped and went to
authorities
she was never put on a trial, though
her accomplices were awarded
capital punishment
was put on Castle arrest in 1610 until
her death
Amelia Dyer
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London (1876 – 1896)
247 infants
strangling or poison and threw their
bodies in Thames
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one of the most prolific female serial
killers in history
called “baby farmer killer” or “baby
butcher”
charged a considerable fee for her
services and even advertised in the
newspaper
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neglect or starvation  strangulation
or opium injection
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caught by London Police in 1896 and
was executed by hanging
Belle Gunness
Indiana: 1900-1908
Stabbed, beheaded, beat victims
to death (over 40 victims)
Black widow killer
her children, adopted
children, many husbands and
boyfriends
Although suspicions grew when
her guests and her children
started disappearing or dying
mysteriously, she still
managed to convince law
enforcement of her innocence
In 1908, staged her own death
and evaded arrest
Madame Popova
• Russia 1879-1909
• Killed abusive husbands for a nominal fee
(over 300 men)
• Inexpensive methods like poisons
• 1909, the police received information from a recently
widowed and repenting woman about Madame Popova’s
involvement in her husband's death
• Captured and executed by firing squad
(1909)
Aileen Wuornos
Selected Discussion Topic
• Related course material (e.g., sex roles,
stereotypes, violence against women,
mental illness, relationships)
• Compared to male perpetrators of similar
crimes (e.g., more surprising/horrifying
or less?)
• Mini essay; discuss & submit next week