The Psychopath Whisperer: The Science of Those Without Conscience (12 page)

Guiteau’s lack of motive left an entire country seeking answers. Following his conviction, Guiteau was hanged in effigy by the citizens
of Flint, Michigan, where he grew up and where people had had to deal with him for years—a poignant end to a tragic story.

Booth, on the other hand, scores only 8.4 out of 40, a low score. While Booth’s psychopathy score is twice as high as the average North American male (the average man will score a 4 out of 40 on the Psychopathy Checklist), he is well below average for a criminal. Prior to his crime, he is the sort of person I might have had a beer with, with the hope I could talk him out of his misguided political ideology. Nevertheless, Booth has gone down in history as the man who committed one of the most notorious acts in American history and robbed the country of one of its greatest presidents. For this, he will remain infamous. But he cannot be labeled a psychopath in the clinical sense. Instead, we are left with calling him what he was—an assassin.

Nineteen ninety-eight. My Sunday morning began with a
sixty-minute commute through the rain to the home of the maximum-security treatment program for Canada’s most notorious violent offenders. This was a special day as a new cohort of inmates was being transferred in to start treatment. I was excited at the chance to interview twenty-five new inmates and get them signed up for my dissertation research studies.

At that point I had been working in Canadian prisons for more than five years. I had interviewed hundreds of inmates, many of them psychopathic. A few had even achieved perfect scores on the Psychopathy Checklist.

On prison workdays I always arrived early, before the inmates were required to stand in their cells for the morning count at 7 a.m. I worked through lunch and stayed until the guards kicked me out at 7 p.m., when the inmates were locked down for the night. I was in heaven. I was living my dream, interviewing psychopaths on a daily basis. It was absolutely fascinating. At the same time, I worried that in a couple years I was going to complete graduate school and leave this place. I was concerned that I would never be able to work at such an amazing facility again, surrounded by such supportive staff and, frankly, such cooperative inmates.

So I worked a lot. I worked weekends because the inmates have more free time then than during the week. I skipped the winter holidays and spent Christmas in prison. Some of my friends said that I was a workaholic and I needed to learn how to take a break. But how could I stop? Especially when there was a whole new crop of inmates arriving. My graduate supervisor, Dr. Robert Hare, told me that he feared that I might be manic. He was somewhat calmer after he discovered that this was not a transient episode. I had worked this schedule for years now.

I had a fresh stack of printed Psychopathy Checklist interviews; the questions and their timing and delivery had been perfected through hundreds of interviews. I set up the video camera on its tripod, unwrapped a fresh videocassette, and loaded it into the bay on the side of the camera. I headed up to the inmates’ housing units, twirling my brass key in my hand. I caught myself whistling a tune. I was excited to meet the new inmates. However, this Sunday would exceed my wildest expectations. Indeed, it was a day I would never forget.

I arrived at the housing unit before the inmates had left their cells. I entered the nurses’ station and fired up the coffeemaker.

The inmates’ cells opened and they rushed for the showers or the TV room. It was football season and the East Coast games were just starting. The inmates crowded into the TV room. I leaned against the door frame, watching the TV to see if I could catch a glimpse of the latest highlights. I flashed back to my own football days, then I realized that I was standing in the way of a violent offender who wanted to grab the last seat in the TV room. He gently nudged me aside and took his seat.

And then suddenly there was tension in the air. I felt it on the back of my neck before I was even conscious of what was happening. The inmates milling around had slowed, the sound of their feet hitting the cold concrete floor halted, the TV seemed to get louder, and all of a sudden I was acutely aware of the steam from the hot coffee in my mug spiraling up toward my nose.

An inmate had exited his cell completely naked and started walking up the tier. I noticed him out of the corner of my eye. He passed the TV room, shower stalls, and empty nurses’ station and
proceeded down the stairs to the doors that led to the outside exercise area. Some of the inmates turned slightly after he had walked by to take a look at him. Others tried not to move or look, but I could see they noticed. The inmates were as confused as they were anxious. What was he doing?

The naked inmate proceeded outside into the rain and walked the perimeter of the short circular track. He walked around the oval track twice. The TV room was on the second floor and the inmates had a good view of the track. Some of the inmates peered outside and watched him. Everyone was distracted; no one spoke. We were all in shock.

The inmate returned, still naked, and walked up the stairs to the second-floor tier and then down to his cell. The tension around the TV room grew. The inmate quickly emerged from his cell with a towel and proceeded to the showers. He walked down the middle of the tier as inmates slowly moved out of his way or retreated into their cells. Other inmates appeared to talk to one another, but they were clearly trying to avoid any direct eye contact with him. I noticed one of the biggest inmates had subtly slowed his pace so that he would not cross the path of the new inmate.

The naked inmate took a quick shower and returned to his cell; there was a slight swagger to his stride. He was not particularly big, but his physique was ripped.

I had to interview him. I took a gulp of coffee and then walked toward his cell.

The first name written on masking tape above his door was “Richard.”

“Good morning. I’m the research guy from UBC. We are conducting interviews and brain wave testing on the inmates in treatment here. Would you be interested in hearing more about it?” I asked.

“Sure” came the reply out of the dark cell.

“All right, then. Why don’t you get dressed and grab a bite to eat, and I’ll come get you in about thirty minutes. We’ll do the interview downstairs in my office.”

I returned to the nurses’ station and had a couple more cups of
coffee. I wanted to make sure I was fully awake when I interviewed Richard.

Richard had dressed in classic prison garb: blue jeans, white T-shirt, and dark green jacket. He sauntered down the stairs and through the covered outdoor walkway to the mess hall for breakfast. He returned to his cell after about fifteen minutes. I couldn’t wait; I went down early to get him.

He followed me to my office and he plopped down in the chair opposite from me.

Before I could get the consent form out of the drawer, he stared at me and said: “You ever need to push that red button?” He was referring to the silver-dollar-sized button in the middle of the wall; when depressed, it signaled distress. A buzzer would go off in the guard bubble down the hallway.

We were both about the same distance away from the button. I realized that I might not be able to reach the button before he could get to me. My mind quickly turned to figuring out a new way to organize the office so that I was closer to the button than the inmates being interviewed.

“No,” I replied. “In the five years I’ve worked here, I’ve never had to push the button.” I threw the
five years
in to let him know that I had some experience behind me. I didn’t want another con game played on me by inmates who thought I was a freshman in maximum security.

Without saying another word, he leaped up and slammed his hand on the button. I didn’t have time to react. He returned to his seat as quickly as he had jumped up.

“Let’s see what happens,” he said calmly, leaning back into his chair.

Over a minute later, we heard doors being slammed open in the distance and the unmistakable sound of running footsteps.

I had thought about getting up and opening the door for the guards, but I would have had to pass by Richard to get to the door. So I just sat in my chair and waited. Richard looked around calmly at the computers, files, and books that had accumulated in my office over the last five years. The office I had commandeered had a little
side closet, about five by five feet, where I had put all my brain wave recording equipment. I had set up the rest of my office so that I could monitor the computers while the inmates sat in the little closet on a comfortable chair and submitted to my EEG studies. The downside to my office configuration was that during interviews the inmate was closest to the exit. Had I become complacent? Should I have rearranged my office and stuck to the rule Dr. Brink mentioned to me on my first day—to always put my seat closer to the door in case I pissed off one of the inmates? I hoped I hadn’t made a fatal mistake.

These thoughts raced through my mind during the eternity it took the guards to get from their station down the stairs and to the end of the hallway, where my office resided. It was a Sunday morning and I was one of the only staff people at the facility. The guards’ response time felt glacial.

A key was jammed into my door and then it was flung open; two guards entered, panting and out of breath, and stared at us.

Richard turned calmly in his chair and said to the guards: “What’s the problem?”

“Someone pushed the alarm button,” the guard stammered. “Everything okay?” His question was directed at me.

“Oh, I must have accidentally pushed it when I took my coat off,” Richard answered. “Everything is just fine; we are just doing the research interview here.”

“Okay,” the guard said. “Don’t do that again.”

I just nodded. I was having trouble speaking.

The guards pulled the door closed and Richard turned and looked at me.

“They call me
Shock Richie
,” he said. “And I’m going to shock you too.”

Mustering as much inner strength as I could, I replied: “I’m looking forward to it; I’m here to be shocked. Take your best shot.”

Shock Richie smiled.

Prison is never boring
, I thought.

We completed the consent form and then I started the Psychopathy Checklist interview with a question I would never ask any other inmate in my career.

“Why did you walk naked out in the rain?”

“Well, I arrived last night. You have to make an impression on the other inmates right away when you get shipped to a new place. I saw you standing there by the TV room. You noticed how all the other inmates got a bit nervous when I walked by. Even the big ones get nervous when you do shit like that. You just got to establish yourself right away. If you don’t, then inmates think they can test you.” He stared quite matter-of-factly at me; the emptiness in his eyes was unnerving.

“When I do stuff like that, inmates don’t know what to think. I’m unpredictable. Sometimes I don’t even know why I do what I do. I
just do it
.”

My mind was racing again. I completely agreed with his logic, albeit twisted; he had already established his dominance at this prison. He was going to score high on at least a few Psychopathy Checklist items. Nike probably never envisioned a psychopathic inmate embracing their slogan
Just Do It
in a manner quite like this.

“You’ve been working here for five years?”

“Yes, since I started graduate school,” I replied.

“Interviewed lots of guys, right?”

“Yes, hundreds of them.”

“Well, you ain’t never met anyone like me,” he said.

“Really? What makes you so special?”

“I’ve done shit you can’t even imagine. I’m gonna shock you like I shock everyone,” he stated calmly. “Let’s get on with it.”

Richie enjoyed doing bad things. He was only in his late twenties when I interviewed him, but he had a rap sheet like no one I had ever interviewed before. As a teenager he had committed burglary, armed robbery of banks and convenience stores, arson for hire, and all kinds of drug-related crimes from distribution to forcing others to mule drugs for him. He would force women to hide plastic baggies of cocaine in their body cavities and transport them across borders and state lines and on plane flights. One of Richie’s girls got a baggie stuck in her vagina. Richie used a knife to “open her up a bit” so he could retrieve his drugs. He said he didn’t use her again after that. When I asked him what he meant by that, he said that he
didn’t use her for sex; she was too loose now, and she lost her nerve about carrying drugs.

Richie smiled as he told me a story of a prostitute he had killed for pissing him off. He actually seemed proud when he described wrapping her up in the same blanket he had suffocated her with so he could keep all the forensic evidence in one place. He put her in the trunk of his car and drove out to a deserted stretch of road bordered by a deep forest. Chuckling, he told me he was pulled over by a highway trooper because he was driving erratically as he searched for a dirt road to drive up so he could bury the body in the woods.

“So the cop pulls me over and comes up to the window and asks me if I have been drinking alcohol. I lied and said no. I told him that I just had to take a piss and I was looking for a place to go. But the cop gave me a field sobriety test anyways. I figured that if I didn’t pass the test, I would have to kill that cop. Otherwise, he might open the trunk and discover the body. The cop didn’t search me when I got out of the car, and I was carrying a knife and a handgun. I’m surprised that I passed that field test since I had had a few drinks that night. I was planning to beat the cop senseless and then I was going to put the girl’s body in the backseat of the cop’s car. Then I would shoot him in the head with his own gun and make it look like a suicide after he accidentally killed the prostitute while raping her in the backseat of his cruiser. Everyone would think it was just another sick dude.”