Serious sex offending against women by men with schizophrenia. Relationship of illness and psychotic symptoms to offending.

Abstract

Little is known about men who commit sex offences in the context of psychosis. To examine the relationship of illness and psychotic symptoms to sex offending in men with schizophrenia. A search of Home Office records was completed for all 84 male restricted hospital order in-patients with schizophrenia, resident in any hospital in England and Wales during May 1997, with an index conviction for a contact sex offence against a woman. At the time of their index offences 80 men were psychotic and half of them had delusions or hallucinations related to the offences. Specific delusional or hallucinatory drive was pertinent in only 18 men but the majority of men committed their first sex offence after onset of schizophrenia. Exclusive sex offending was uncommon. When a man with schizophrenia commits a serious sex offence the illness is, more commonly than not, relevant to that offence even though a direct symptom relationship may be relatively unusual.