(Sample Material)

Evaluating the Monsters Who Live Among Us

by Samantha Stein, PsyD 

Evil is unspectacular and always human

And shares our bed and eats at our own table.

–W. H Auden

Disclaimer

The stories in this book are true. All of the facts of the cases are based on my first-hand knowledge; I have not exaggerated to heighten drama.  

In telling these stories, however, I have confronted constraints.  A psychologist’s obligation to keep their client’s information confidential is both ethical and legal. I have therefore changed all of the names and altered many of the details so that no individual could be identified. In addition to using pseudonyms, I have changed ages, birth places, dates, locations, and races. I have not altered the facts of the crimes or my experiences with the clients and in the prisons.

I have made the changes I did for many reasons: to protect psychologist-patient confidentiality, to protect the families of both victims of crimes and the criminals who commit them (even the families of sex offenders are entitled to privacy and respect), to conceal the identity of those who would not want their association with me revealed, including correctional officers, other psychologists, friends, parole agents, judges, and prosecutors.  

Finally, I have also changed the names of the members of my family. While my family is an integral part of my story and a source of pride for me, I thought they were all entitled to lead a private and “normal” life in spite of the intense nature of the work I do and my desire to write about it. I have endeavored to write an honest memoir without revealing confidences, so I have told my story (and the stories of others) in a way that is faithful to the truth as I see it, as well as to the people they feature, without betraying their trust. 

Final Note

This book contains content that is triggering or upsetting to people. There isn’t any way to write a book like this without descriptions of abuse and violence, but I have done my utmost to leave out unnecessary details of events and crimes to prevent psychological harm to my readers. That said, for some, reading about child abuse, domestic violence, assault, rape, molestation, and other forms of sexual abuse and other traumas may trigger traumatic memories, feelings, thoughts, or associations. If so, I encourage you to seek help and support from a qualified source. 

I have written this book, in spite of its challenging material, because it is my utmost hope that ultimately this book will be healing, and encourage a deeper and necessary level of conversation about the issues within. 

Prologue

I’m in a giant mansion wandering from room to room. I open a door and a man runs up to me. “I just have to find someone to celebrate with!” He smiles wide and claps his hands with a bang.

My chest balls into a fist and my breath catches–where are my children? Somehow, I know this man is not safe. I start running through the mansion. I have to find them before he does! I’m frantically searching but can’t find them anywhere. My heart is pounding and my eyes wild as I run through room after room, until I finally throw open a door and discover them in bed with him. My heart falls as I walk in, laser focused, my veins on fire. I can see he’s showing them what his genitals look like. I feel I will beat him to death or choke him with my bare hands.

“Get away from them!” I scream at the top of my lungs and lunge toward them, waking myself with a jolt, my voice hoarsely crying out in the quiet. The room is stifling hot and I’m dripping with sweat; I realize that Josh and I accidentally left the heat on during the night. The sheets and blankets are twisted around me; I feel bound, trapped. I’m deeply disturbed, agitated, and angry–angry about all the children, betrayed and abused. 

Angry that the case I read yesterday has invaded my psyche.

Introduction: Meeting with Monsters

I’m a forensic psychologist. This may sound glamorous, but the word “forensic” simply means “the use of science in the investigation and establishment of facts or evidence in a court of law.”  In other words, my job is to apply psychology to legal situations where it may be used in the courtroom. Sometimes it’s exciting; mostly it’s just hard work.

My career in psychology initially began with victims, and I assumed after receiving my doctorate I would continue that work. However, as I gained more experience, I began to recognize that often the line between “victim” and “perpetrator” was less clear than I’d thought–I worked with a boy who’d been molested as a toddler and now, in elementary school, was fondling other boys. I met men and women accused of domestic violence who had powerful trauma histories growing up. I learned that trauma work and prevention work were often intimately intertwined–not every victim becomes a perpetrator, but the vast majority of perpetrators have been victimized.

I began working actively in forensics with sex offenders in 1997 at a clinical training program in San Francisco–a setting where I was in training to become a therapist. It was almost by chance I ended up at that particular program, and I arrived anxious that I wouldn’t be able to feel empathy for offenders. There’s constant messaging in our society–through news reporting, TV dramatization, talk shows, etc.–that sex offenders are simply evil and cannot be rehabilitated. But studies and statistics tell a different story, as does my experience working with and evaluating offenders over the next 15 years. I’ve been repeatedly surprised at the capacity for so many people convicted of sex offenses to change when they do the work, and I’ve been privileged to be a part of the process. I spent the following decade working in individual and group therapy with sex offenders of different ages, races, religions, genders, ethnicities, and sexual orientations. During those years, I got to know and work with the human beings who committed what our society deems the most heinous of crimes, helping them learn a different way of life. 

In addition to providing treatment, I also gained highly specialized training in sexual offender assessments, honing my ability to assess mental health and paraphilic diagnoses as well as for future risk of offense. I worked under the supervision and mentorship of experts and Subsequently, I became the one who was presenting at conferences, teaching, and training others.

While my experience as a treatment provider was frequently rewarding, I was well aware that there remained serious sex offenders who fall outside of the norm: those who feel compelled to repeatedly commit sex crimes in spite of imprisonment or intervention. In 2006, I brought my expertise with sex offenders to the California Department of Mental Health’s Sexual Offender Commitment Program, where I worked under a law–the Sexually Violent Predator Act–that requires assessing sex offenders who had served their prison sentences but who might still pose a serious threat of committing a sex crime if released into society. If found to meet the criteria of dangerousness of the law, these (almost entirely) men, after completing their prison sentences, go to trial to determine if they should be sent to a locked mental health facility until they’re deemed (via new assessment and/or graduation from the program) to no longer be a threat to society.

Evaluating high risk sex offenders under the Sexually Violent Predator (SVP) law is highly specialized. At the time when I conducted these evaluations, there were almost 18,000 licensed psychologists in the state of California and fewer than 110 who performed these evaluations. Expert forensic work as a psychologist in general is rare; expert evaluations and testimony as an SVP evaluator is even rarer. As an SVP evaluator, expertise in the statistics and science of forensic evaluations and knowledge about sex offending are necessary, and having the treatment experience is a bonus–it often helps us form a more nuanced picture of the offender. I never shy away from holding the offenders responsible for their actions and make no excuses for them. But I also have empathy and compassion for many of them as human beings. I’ve gotten to know so many of them in a deeply personal way–heard their life stories and struggles. So, I do not approach my evaluations with damning preconceptions; I individually evaluate each case to determine if the man (as they are, by far majority men) sitting in front of me is too dangerous, by legal definition, to live in our communities.

This book represents an intersection between my life and the lives of the men I evaluated. As a forensic psychologist, I have had to decide if people who have done terrible things meet the criteria to be locked up indefinitely in a locked mental institution. As I met with and evaluated these men who committed abhorrent acts, I strived to do my work to the best of my ability and as ethically as I can. I employed my professional knowledge and experience, and met the men with compassion, empathy, and understanding. 

That said, I have not existed solely as a forensic psychologist; I also have a life outside of this work. While writing this book, I was married for 20 years with three children. While I have tried to keep my professional and personal lives separate over the years, it is not possible to separate them completely, and in some ways I wouldn’t want to–my growth and knowledge in one area informs the other. My experiences as a female and parent gives me insight in my work, and my knowledge and experience as a forensic evaluator gives me the tools to keep myself and my children safe. As a human being, I have never stopped looking for answers about sexuality, danger, risk, humanity, parenting, and passion–ultimately, gaining new perspectives.

Over the past 25+ years as a psychologist my practice has expanded to include many other issues, such as addiction, couples therapy, family work, and people simply wanting to figure out how to live their best possible lives. But throughout that time my work with offenders has always held a unique place in my psyche, mind, and heart.

Part One: Committed

The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil,

but by those who watch them without doing anything.

Albert Einstein

Heading Out in the Dark

I wake in the dark hours of the morning to head out to prison for my scheduled interview with a violent sex offender. By the time I arrive at the prison, our house will be filled with light and commotion, Josh getting our eleven-year-olds Eva and Rachel and our eight-year-old Kye up and ready for school. But at this moment the house is dark, still, and quiet. Even Jesse, lying sideways on her ratty dog bed, lies motionless. I’ll be long gone by the time they all wake.

I meditate, then slip quietly out of the bedroom so as not to wake Josh. I dress in the bathroom where I hung my clothes the night before: button-down shirt, blazer, dress pants, glasses, and stylish but comfortable black shoes. My forensic psychologist uniform doubles as an emotional barricade, and as I look in the mirror I do, in fact, feel armored by its professionalism. I’m not wearing tan, denim blue, or orange by decree, to ensure that in the event of a fight or prison riot I won’t be mistaken for one of the inmates and accidentally shot by a correctional officer attempting to restore order.

Once driving, I’m pretty quickly over the bridge and out of San Francisco; I-80 is deserted in the wee hours. Cool, dark, and lonely is just how I like it. I’m wide awake and ready for whatever’s ahead. A day in prison never goes exactly how anyone thinks it will, and the men I meet are always more than their files portray–their files provide the details of their contact with the criminal justice system but do little to describe the person and his history or what he’ll be like to sit in a room with. But I’ve done this many times before, and the one-and-a-half-hour drive passes without much thought as I drift between stations on the radio.

I arrive at the California State Prison, Solano at 8:00 a.m. The sun is up. I reach the vast parking lot and stop for a moment to take in the trees and fields and order my thoughts. It’s fall, but much of California looks the same year-round, and the area surrounding this prison is serene. There aren’t many people who want to live close to prisons, so that’s not unusual: a left turn up a bucolic road and suddenly the massive compound appears behind the trees–a large asphalt parking lot and a twelve-foot high metal fence topped by a roll of barbed wire surrounding a collection of gray, ugly concrete buildings.

I park and clip on my prison ID, grab my bag, and walk through the lot to enter the small office at the front of the building where I show my badge to the correctional officer. He’s chatting with another officer and continues the conversation as he checks my ID, gives me a nod, and searches my bag. He hands it back to me after I walk through the metal detector. On the other side, I stand and wait patiently for the door to be buzzed open along with the group (attorneys, correctional officers here for a shift change, prison staff) that’s accumulated. We step through and wait for the door to click behind us. After a few beats, the second door clicks open, and we enter.

I walk through the prison, a woman alone in a mostly male world. Men in identical prison denim stride through hallways in organized lines monitored by correctional officers in olive drab jumpsuits and black boots. Surfaces are hard and naked, so voices echo loudly and constantly and a kind of noisy controlled chaos reigns. On my first visit to prison, I was shocked to find myself in such close proximity to inmates in hallways and in the yard. I’d imagined the inmates were kept segregated from everyone else. Instead, prison is more like a small town, inhabited mostly by men, all wearing the same clothing with “CDCR INMATE” lettered across the back. Only the inhabitants of this town can never leave.

I’m surrounded by the men, the constant sound of voices, of metal, of heavy doors opening and slamming shut. These days I’m no longer anxious to be there, but I’m not completely at ease, either.

When I arrive at prison, I’ve already reviewed most of the records of the men I’m about to meet—criminal records, police reports, court reports, psychological evaluations, prison records, and medical records—but I always read through some additional paperwork that’s only available on site. It’s only at the prison where I can find out if he has also committed rules violations while here, and sometimes there is additional information that might be important–notes about jobs he has held and ways he has conducted himself. When I’ve finished, the officer in charge of coordinating these visits walks me to the interview office and goes to get the inmate. I sit down at the desk, pull out my interview forms and a pen, and wait. Prisons are very specific about what you can and cannot bring inside–my purse, cell phone, and everything else I’ve driven with here are locked in the car. I have only my keys, my ID, my interview forms, and a couple of pens in my bag. The chair is hard and uncomfortable. It’s a medium-sized office with bare white walls, a desk, two chairs, and a phone (landline). A small window covered with a grate lets in a bit of natural light, but the room is flooded by bright fluorescent bulbs. The place is clean, almost sterile.

I’m prepared and relaxed, mostly at ease, but I have yet to meet this particular man, and his files are replete with violence. I click and unclick the top of my pen. I’ve read the victims’ reports in detail, so I know the violence he’s capable of. I’ve studied what his life as a criminal has been like and how he has behaved in prison. But I also know that a man rarely looks like his prison records—most often he looks pretty ordinary. Dissonance is always a part of this job: the backstory, the violence, and the history versus the person, the human, the face, the eyes, the posture, the thoughts, and the feelings in front of me. Ultimately, I know most likely I’m not the person in this meeting who will feel most nervous today. The stakes are significantly higher for him. For these inmates, my evaluations–my “yes” or “no” decisions– could be a part of what determines the rest of his life. This means that every so often my introduction is met with anger. But most of the men are well-behaved and polite, answering my questions to the best of their ability. They desperately want to go free.

Under California law–and in 20 states, the federal government, and the District of Columbia–sex offenders who’ve served time (ranging from a few months to more than 20 years) in prison for serious sex offenses are evaluated prior to their release back to the community. If they’re found to lack control over a mental disorder such that they pose a serious risk of committing future predatory sexual offenses, they can be committed indefinitely to a sex offender treatment program at a state-run mental hospital instead of being released on parole. 

My job in this process is to evaluate whether or not these men meet the criteria under this law: I’m required to answer the fundamental question of whether or not this person is likely to continue to commit sex offenses. In real-life terms, it means answering questions such as: Is a man who was hallucinating and strung-out on methamphetamines for six days in a row when he raped a young girl still a threat to other children when he’s sober and released from serving a 22-year prison sentence for the crime? Should he be locked up indefinitely for a potential future crime he has not yet committed because he might commit it?

Of the hundreds of thousands of sex offenders in California, only a very small number end up being evaluated under WIC 6600–the Sexually Violent Predator Act. In a year, approximately 25,000 sex offenders are referred to the Sex Offender Commitment Program (at the Department of Mental Health) for review. Any inmate who has a conviction for one of the qualifying offenses under the law will be referred. Of those, approximately 7,500 are referred for an SVP evaluation. Of these 7,500, approximately 1,500 will be found to meet the criteria of WIC6600 and therefore face indefinite involuntary institutionalization.

Out of more than 100 evaluations I have conducted, only 10% of those have met the criteria for indefinite hospitalization, the average among SVP evaluators. In other words, the men who meet the criteria are not the usual sex offenders who live and work among us, who have made a terrible lapse in judgment, or acted while angry, intoxicated, or depressed, and who most likely will never to do it again. They aren’t even the “career criminals” who simply commit an act of sexual violence in a long list of criminal acts over the course of their lifetimes. Those found to meet the criteria are the rare men who repeatedly kidnap women and rape them. Or they’re sent to prison for molesting a boy, then molest several more boys after being released, then after another imprisonment molest several more boys. 

For an inmate to meet the WIC 6600 criterion, the outcome of the forensic psychological evaluation must be the answer “yes” to the following three questions:

1. Has the inmate been convicted of at least one “sexually violent offense?” Qualified sexually violent offenses are listed in a specified section of the penal code, and the offender must have used “force, violence, duress, menace or fear” or the victim was under the age of 14.
2. Does the inmate have a diagnosable mental disorder that predisposes the person to the commission of criminal and predatory sexual acts? 
3. Is the inmate likely to engage in sexually violent predatory criminal behavior as a result of his/her diagnosed mental disorder without appropriate treatment and custody?

In order to answer these questions, I must thoroughly review all available records and travel to the prison to meet with the inmate for a two-hour-plus interview. I then must utilize all this information, along with the current measures, studies, and statistics, to write a thorough psychological evaluation and ultimately answer the above three questions, which typically takes me about 30 or so pages of report to discuss completely. 

Some states that have these laws have only one forensic evaluator. In California two evaluators are assigned to independently evaluate the same inmate. If we both come to the same conclusion, which we do most of the time because there is a science to it (imperfect as it may be), the inmate is either discharged on parole (if they don’t meet criteria) or is referred to the District Attorney for SVP prosecution (if they do). If they do meet the criteria, and the DA takes the case, it goes before a judge for a Probable Cause hearing, and if the judge sees probable cause it goes to a civil trial with a jury. The evaluators serve as expert witnesses during the probable cause hearing and the trial. The outcome of this trial is the jury’s determination if the individual is sent to the mental health institution indefinitely or released on parole. 

If the two evaluators disagree (one finds the inmate meets the criteria and the other says he doesn’t), a third evaluator is asked to conduct an evaluation. It’s unusual, but it happens – the science of evaluating human beings is imperfect and somewhat subjective, especially in cases that aren’t entirely clear cut. If the third evaluator finds the person does not meet the criteria for indefinite incarceration, the individual is released. If the third evaluator finds the person does meet the criteria, then the law requires that a fourth evaluation be conducted. So, the bar for involuntary institutionalization is high, with many safeguards: in order for a person to be referred for institutionalization under the SVP Law in California, they must be found by Department of Mental Health evaluators to meet the criteria of the law by either 2 out of 2 or 3 out of 4 forensic experts. In order to be hospitalized indefinitely, a judge and jury must agree. 

Of the 1,500 offenders who are found to meet the criteria each year, only approximately 600 of them may actually be prosecuted in a civil commitment trial and face involuntary hospitalization (the other 900 will be released on parole)–the DA in the county of their conviction makes the call. Of these 600 cases, historically around 450 of them will result in a finding by the jury that the person should be committed indefinitely to the inpatient sex offender treatment program at the locked mental institution.

After a weapons search, Joe is led into the room. He’s more than six-and-a-half-feet tall, his bulky arms, muscular chest, and broad shoulders visible under his prison uniform. His bearing is formidable, despite being on crutches due to missing the bottom of his right leg—shot off during a fight in between incarcerations, according to his file. His presence is a visceral reminder of his lengthy history of brutal violence against others, especially women.

In spite of the obvious match between his presence and the description in his file, I ask to check his prison ID–a license-sized card with his photo and prison ID number. Early on in my work, I started an interview with a man who had the right name but was the wrong person—the prison had summoned a different inmate with the same name. I can still remember my shock when I discovered the error, thankfully fairly early on. This evaluation has severe consequences, so it’s a mistake I won’t be making again.

The ID checks out. I nod to the correctional officer, who leaves. Joe sits down across the desk from me, and I study him as I hand back his ID. Joe is in his 50’s and has an intensity akin to charisma—his pale skin, slow-blinking blue eyes, and incredible calm in the face of what, for most, would be an extremely anxiety-provoking circumstance. I’m aware as I study him that he’s studying me in return. I’m not afraid, but I’m on alert. My senses feel close to the skin and my mind sharp as we assess one another.

The correctional officers down the hall and the personal alarm on the desk are part of the reason I’m not afraid, in spite of the fact that he isn’t restrained in any way by chains or cuffs. The alarm looks like a garage door opener, I sit with it directly in front of me. I could grab it if I needed to. I’ve yet to use one, but I’m glad it’s there. Sometimes men know in advance why I’m here to see them, but often they don’t. I explain to Joe that I’m a psychologist with the Department of Mental Health.

“I’m here to evaluate you,” I say to him, “and I’m going to read an explanation of why I’m here. If you have any questions, I will be happy to answer them.”

I take a deep breath as I launch into a legally required explanation of the ramifications of the conversation we’re about to have, reading the consent form out loud.  I say, “You are being evaluated to determine whether you may be a Sexually Violent Predator under Section 6600 of the California Welfare and Institutions Code.” I explain the purpose of the evaluation, the process, and what the outcome might mean.

In effect, I’m telling him this: Instead of being released from prison at your upcoming parole date (for which you’ve been waiting months, years, decades), you may instead be locked up, indefinitely, in a mental institution. And I’m here to figure out which to recommend. Release, or lock up. Joe has just completed serving 7 years.

I pause from my reading and look up. The information comes as a shock to most men, so the moment can be unnerving for them, to say the least. For me, it’s the moment when the weight of the responsibility and power of my role hits me with full force, every time.

These men know why they’re in prison. They know they’ve been convicted of committing a sex offense. But my words still come as a shock because most of them are not aware of the Sexually Violent Predator Act. Even those who are aware of the law seldom think of themselves as “predators.” Most prisoners, like most people, tend to see their lives as a series of random events rather than viewing their actions as part of a malevolent pattern. They are like the rest of us, with problems big and small: the alcoholic who wakes up with a hangover but thinks, “Well, next time I won’t drink so much,” or the mother who feels guilty after smacking her child but thinks, “Next time she’ll think twice before mouthing off.” In the back of their minds, they wonder if they might have a problem, but facing that problem is overwhelming, like trying to swim to a shore you cannot see. So, they, like many of us, tend to see their lives as a collection of events and choices or decisions that they made at the time and then move on from. They don’t tend to look for patterns, or to notice when they occur, and they often don’t take full responsibility for many of the choices they make.

I’ve tried to imagine what it would be like if the tables were turned—if I were the one sitting down with a stranger (and, for some of these men, a female) whose diagnosis could so radically alter the course of my life. How would I process that weight of this moment? How does he process it? I look into Joe’s eyes, and he meets my gaze coolly and simply nods. He has understood and gives off only an eerie calm.

I look down and continue to read, explaining the SVP process. There’s no confidentiality, I tell Joe. Anything he says could go into my report and be heard in court if I testify. I tell him the interview is voluntary, but that if he doesn’t consent, the evaluation will still be completed using only legal and prison records.

While they don’t want to incriminate themselves by saying the wrong thing (and they are not permitted to have counsel present for this evaluation), most men agree to the interview. They’re either afraid to look uncooperative or looking to tell their own side of the story. Joe simply shrugs, agrees with a nod to sign the consent form. “Let’s do it,” he says. He signs it and I get out my notepad, ready to record every word he says.

Joe’s record reads like the stories that compel lawmakers to be “tough on crime,” a criminal record that starts when he’s thirteen and only gets worse as time goes on. Between the ages of eighteen and thirty-eight he was arrested nineteen times: for burglaries, drug possessions and/or sales, selling stolen property, battery, kidnapping, attempted kidnapping, robbery, battery/assault, and others. Rather than a more typical progression from drugs and burglary to more violent crimes, his records show he was committing whatever crimes suited him, whenever he wanted. Most notable (and the reason I’m here) among the crimes are his multiple sex offenses, which are brutal and intense. He has beaten women and raped them in violent ways. One time he broke a woman’s jaw and then forced her to perform oral sex.

I ask Joe to tell me about his criminal history. He replies, “I’ve got too many arrests to count.” And it’s true. Even though his last prison sentence was for twenty-five years, his criminal activity didn’t stop once he was on the inside. They never caught him doing anything that warranted new charges, but it’s clear he has never been terribly concerned with following rules, regardless of where he has lived. And now he’s about to be released from prison, a man in his late 50’s–past the middle years of his life–a life spent as a bully, inside and outside of prison.

During the interview, Joe is casual while talking about himself and forceful about portraying his life from his perspective: full of contradictions and completely different from the records I just read. Each time I ask him about a discrepancy, he throws back his head and laughs.

“Some people just don’t understand me,” he says in a slow, laconic voice, or “People exaggerate,” or “People just don’t understand what’s going on.” He stares directly at me when he speaks, a smile playing across his face, his unwavering eye contact daring me to contradict him.

“It says here in your records that you got kicked out of a therapy group for lying,” I say, “Would you tell me about it?”

“Nah, I quit,” he replies.

“How do you explain the contradiction? Are the records wrong?”

“People lie,” he says, and shrugs. His eyes meet mine. We pause a beat.

As the interview proceeds it becomes clear that he has no empathy for anyone he has harmed. I ask him about his early years. He chuckles.

“I remember one time,” he says, smiling, “I was little. Maybe five years old. I used to love to play tricks on my family. One time I hid out in the backyard after dark. I could see all the lights on in the house, and I could hear when they started looking for me. They all freaked—yelling for me, trying to find me. I was laughing when I finally went inside.”

He tells story after story like this, and it becomes clear that he’s very likely psychopathic—someone who truly experiences no empathy for others—and that even childhood physical abuse, though likely, can’t explain how he turned out this way. My interview includes all of the questions that will allow me to eventually score him on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist, but I’ve done this enough where I already know how he’ll score. 

There’s some new research that points to a difference in the brain structure (in the amygdala) of psychopaths, but it’s still mostly unknown why the rare individual comes along who is unable to feel anything for others. However it happens, this man seems to be one of them. He clinically tells me about severely beating a boy in high school with a rope just because he was “curious what it would be like.” He recounts the stories of abuse he has inflicted as if they were any regular story someone might tell about their life, without feeling or expectations of my reaction one way or another.

One could say I’ve been presented with a rare opportunity to interview a subject who is a likely psychopath and a potential sexual sadist, and to be honest, I’m fascinated. But the interview takes a toll; as good as I am at staying grounded and compartmentalizing, it’s an effort to stay detached. Not because of how alien or frightening the situation is, but because there are ways in which Joe is charming, funny, and direct. His lies are clever part-truths, which at times seem almost plausible. I have to continually check my records to stay grounded in the facts.

“It says here you’ve struggled with a cocaine addiction,” I say.

“Nah,” he replies, “I was never really addicted to any drugs. I just happened to be around the wrong people and that’s the way it is in life.”

“But even in your most recent case you admitted you were using cocaine,” I cock my head sideways and use a puzzled tone, confronting the contradiction without confronting him.

He doesn’t miss a beat. He leans forward in his chair and props his elbows on his thighs, his biceps flexing. “Some people get off with claims of being high or temporary insanity,” he says. “For some reason that didn’t work for me.”

As I write all of this down, I become aware that he hasn’t actually answered the question, or many of my other questions. His answers lead in circles, or to insinuations, rather than to conclusions. He lies without lying. He talks but says nothing.

There are times when he seems like an ordinary man, and it almost feels like we make some sort of connection. He smiles easily. He’s disarmingly warm and charming, if prone to the occasional cliché. “People are capable of change,” he asserts at one point, “and I have changed for the better.” His smile is expansive. I can see how some women might be seduced by him–all of his rape victims were women he knew.

It’s work to retain perspective, to figure out who he is and what he’s about. He’s good at knocking people off-balance, off-topic, off-center. He talks about a teacher he admired, or how much he loved his wife. It feels ordinary, until I ask him about charges for almost beating a man to death, or the time his wife came to visit him in prison, and he lost his temper and began to beat her.

I ask him, as I do all men I evaluate, in detail about each of the sexual offenses he has committed, each of the women who accused him of approaching them seductively before he turned brutal and violent.

“There’s a case here in 1994,” I say, “when you were reported to have forced this woman to perform oral sex on you, which you alternated with raping her anally until she vomited. Do you remember this case and what happened?”

He laughs. “She was a liar,” he says, “she was a prostitute who just wanted to get paid.”

He laughs off each of the sex offenses, one by one, casually denying any of them happened. It’s not unusual for someone to deny committing offenses, laughing or not, so I push him a bit to see what will happen: I let him know that I doubt he’s being truthful–that I might not be as snowed as he thinks I am. I’m not expecting much, but offenders with a conscience will sometimes open up when pressed a little. Perhaps I can get him to slip up and admit something.

“Wow,” I say, in a puzzled tone, looking up from my paperwork, “what bad luck that all of these women have lied about you. Is none of this true? Maybe some of it is true?” I pause and look him calmly in the eyes, waiting.

He sits back and folds his arms, equally calm. “None of it’s true,” he says, and looks at me with eyebrows slightly raised, daring me to try to get more out of him, confident I’ll back down.

His eyes are cold and without any detectable feeling, and now my skin prickles. I know that in this moment it wouldn’t take much for him to turn violent on me. He is in control, visibly calculating his every word and move. And he doesn’t give a damn about consequences.

The charged moment passes as I casually move on to the next question, a benign one. I continue to take notes, the evaluation taking shape in the back of my mind. It’s my task in this interview to get as much from Joe as possible, both from what he says and from what is left unsaid. I have more than twenty pages of questions to get through, and the rest of our time together moves swiftly. By the end of the two hours, I have a pretty good sense of what Joe is like. A man who does what he wants, looks out for himself, and has little (if any) empathy or care for anyone else.

After my last question I ask if there’s anything he’d like to add or ask, but he just shrugs, half smiles, and shakes his head. I push back my chair and walk by him to the door to alert the officer in the hall that the interview is finished, careful not to leave my back exposed to him in the process.

I’m relieved the hours-long interview is finally over. My mouth is dry and I’m itching to get away from prison’s antiseptic smell and cold filtered light. I’ve been up since before dawn, and the intensely focused state I must inhabit to conduct these interviews has worn me down. I’m relieved I don’t have more than one interview today. Sometimes I have two or three; today this one was enough.

The weak winter sun is still high but has moved to the other side of the sky when I step outside the prison. I shiver a little but am glad to be out in the air—relieved to be free.

I don’t notice the scenery on the drive home. I’m thinking about Joe and the case as a whole: what I said, what he said, what the records said, sifting through it all. There’s no question he fits the profile of a psychopathic individual, someone who is completely without empathy. But as far as my job is concerned, that’s only part of the question and not even the most important one. The question I’ll have to wrestle with for my evaluation is: Why did he commit the sex offenses specifically, and will he feel a powerful urge to do it again? The law is designed to capture only those who feel compelled to commit sex offenses over and over again because of a mental disorder related to the crimes. I’ll have to decide if he fits this profile. It’s not a question of whether or not he’s a dangerous man. Or a bad man. The question is whether or not he’s likely to rape a woman again.

I will need to take into account the fact that despite his long, violent history, he has not committed any acts of violence in almost twenty years–either inside or outside of prison–and that he’s now in his fifties. He may not have changed much psychologically, but physically, he has, in addition to his missing leg. Even though he’s fit and muscular, research indicates that something happens to men as they age—perhaps related to testosterone production—that slows them down and makes them less aggressive or prone to violence.

This case is complex, and on the way home I decide that I’ll consult a colleague or two. In cases where someone is brutal and violent but may not meet the criteria, it’s always good to have a second opinion.

There was something haphazard to the way that I got into this work–the opportunity presented itself, and I found that I was good at it. But what a supervisor said to me years ago still rings true for me and motivates me to continue it: When a sex offender makes changes for the better, it could mean trauma prevention for would-be victims. Offenders work is prevention work–offenders who no longer offend do not create more victims.

The sun is lower by the time I cross the bridge back into the city. I fiddle with the radio and absentmindedly sing along, shifting my mind toward home, my kids, my life.

Home

I arrive home in time for pre-dinner chaos. Eleven-year-old Rachel and Eva are in their bedroom at their desks, chatting noisily over pop music as they do homework. Eight-year-old Kye stands in the kitchen talking to their dad loudly over the rock music Josh is playing while he cooks.

“Hi Mommy!” Their eight-year-old face lights up when I walk in. They throw their arms around my neck as I bend down to embrace them.

“Hey sweetie.” My shoulders drop an inch, and my heart loosens inside of its bony house as I squeeze them back with a deep inhale, exhale, and a smile. “How was your day?”

“Good,” they pull back and return the smile, releasing our hug. “I got an ‘A’ on my math test!”

“That’s great, Kye!” I continue to smile as I straighten and walk over to Josh.

“Hey,” I say, hooking my arm around his middle and kissing him hello.

“Hey,” he kisses me back. “Dinner’s almost ready.”

“Excellent,” I reply, meaning it. Every part of me is blessing him that I don’t have to start cooking right now. “I’m gonna go put my stuff down and change, and then we can meditate?”

“Yup.”

“Okay kids!” I yell. “Almost time to meditate!” I poke my head into the twins’ room. “Hey you two.”

“Hi, Mom!” they reply in unison. I’m smiling again.

I walk back down the hall into the small office I share with Josh, drop my bag by my desk, and head for the bedroom. There, I peel off my professional armor down to my underwear, replacing it with my favorite evening wear: flannel pajama bottoms, a tank top, and a sweatshirt. I can feel my body loosen and unwind and I stretch and roll my neck to pull it even looser. The house quiets as Rachel, Eva, Josh, and I sit down to meditate and Kye begins their walking mantra. The kids were introduced to twice-daily Transcendental Meditation (TM) when they each were four years old, so they know the drill. It’s part of our routine.

Sitting down to meditate isn’t always easy; sometimes it feels like making a dog sit before taking her for a walk. I’ve been practicing TM for close to thirty years, and still sometimes at the end of the day I think, “I really don’t feel like meditating today,” or “I just don’t have time.” 

I do it anyway. I have to. When I first started working with sexual and violent offenders, one of my coworkers said he made it a ritual to go home right after work and take a long, hot shower to cleanse himself from the hard things he’d heard that day. I get it. What’s a “normal” reaction to interviewing a violent sex offender? My feelings are what anyone else’s might be: sometimes there’s empathy, fascination, enjoyment or fulfillment; often there’s horror, anger, and deep sadness.

To be effective at my job, I have to partition these experiences. I have to stay separate from my reactions, thoughts, and feelings about the cases in the same way I do the cases themselves. I observe what I feel and think in the same way that I observe what I hear, see, and understand during my interviews. My focus, effort, and concentration are on paying attention to all cues, both external and internal, and reacting to none of them. It’s a deeply felt and rigorous process that goes beyond vague platitudes about maintaining professional boundaries.

Leaving my interview with Joe today, I walked out to my car and started the process of lifting that partition dividing my inner experience from my observing mind. As the partition lifts, I feel ungrounded for a while. My thoughts swirl as I remember things Joe said, how I felt, moments between us. I think about what’s in the files, how he’ll score on the risk measures, but I also think about what it means that someone like him exists in the world. What if my children meet someone like him someday? I’m integrating all the information gathered during the interview and forming a picture in my mind, but I’m also integrating the experience into my life, and placing it in my knowledge of the world.

My homecoming is the final stage in my process of reentry. Kye throws their arms around me, and I breathe in their smell, taking in their joy at seeing me, their excitement, my overwhelming love for them. I yearn to be fully present with them, Josh, Rachel, and Eva, to give my family my all. But a part of me is still thinking, integrating, and observing.

So, I sit down. I sit down on the big king bed that fills our little room and close my eyes. My mantra comes. Thoughts come, feelings come. The mantra returns. Each time I return to the mantra, my mind gets quieter, more settled. My body relaxes. My mantra comes and I’m transcending until there is nothing. There is only silence. And being. My heart unwraps like a present.

When I open my eyes, my mind is quieter. I have landed, here. Everything in my day—Joe, the prison, his victims, the drive home, my children, Josh, my dog—they’re all real, and important. At the same time, they’re all ordinary, and part of life. I’m home. I’m fully me, again.

We finish meditating and rise for dinner. Josh and I have been married for our entire adult lives, and we move in a shared rhythm as we go about the evening. Dinner is put on the table, kids are called in to eat, everyone sits and takes a quiet moment to appreciate the meal. Then Rachel launches into a critique of the outfit her math teacher was wearing today.

“Why would she wear that jacket with those pants?” she asks. “They didn’t even look good together and were terrible for her body shape. I mean, really.” She rolls her eyes. Creating a new look every day is her driving passion; she’s acutely aware of the fashion choices of others. Today her hair is fuchsia, her outfit a study in black and white.

“It’s true,” Eva smiles, validating her twin’s perspective. She has a very different look, the neurodivergent, understated, soft and comfortable tomboy to her sister’s curated, girly punk, but she can still appreciate good taste.

Rachel and Eva have entered middle school this year, and we are all adjusting. Feeling grateful not to be a middle school teacher, I wonder how long I have before my style comes under the microscope.

“There are a lot of complicated factors that go into choosing your outfit,” I say, “and not everyone knows how to do it well.”

Kye tries to chime in with their own opinions. “Maybe she thinks it looks good,” they say.

Rachel rolls her eyes. “You’re missing the point, Kye. Of course she thinks it looks good. She has bad taste, that’s what I’m trying to say.”

“Well, taste is something a lot of people have to learn, Rachel.” I step in. I’d rather avoid an argument and there is a middle ground here. “Most people aren’t taught what clothing works with other clothing and they certainly aren’t taught what flatters their shape. She’s doing the best she can with the tools she has.”

“That’s fair.” Rachel continues eating and Kye nods. She feels validated and Kye appreciates the empathy. 

       As dinner continues, I feel my heart loosen another notch in my chest, and I’m grateful. Grateful for how these four people root me in the ordinary. There is bickering from time to time, but no one worries about being loved. No one at this table is guarded, including me. I don’t have to be careful in choosing my words here or maintain an emotional distance from what’s being discussed.

There’s nothing magical about this dinner. We pass the salt, we tease and laugh, listen and support, or talk over one another and sometimes lash out in frustration. We connect or fail to connect in all of the everyday ways that families do, and don’t. But it is this ordinariness that allows me to breathe and open again. For most of that preciously mundane half-hour, I leave the dark, dangerous, and ugly world of prisons and sex offenders behind.

Having unwound from the day, I’m exhausted by the time dinner is over, but cleanup still has to happen. Josh and I chat about our days as we clear and wash dishes and the kids head to their rooms to finish their homework. I have to remind myself to listen as he tells me about his workday. I’m interested and want to feel connected, despite my fatigue and the distraction of processing the meeting with Joe. 

When Josh asks about my day, I carefully consider my response. I feel protective of him and mindful of my urge to unload. A part of me wants to tell everything to him, to process it out loud and get it off my chest. But I’m ever mindful of the psychological effect of these violent, awful cases. It’s my job to be exposed to all of this trauma, not his. He has never asked me to shelter him from the details, but I feel instinctively protective of him, and we’ve agreed this is the best course of action for him. Plus it forces me to leave my work at work and just be home. I’ve heard it said that police deal with people at their maddest, saddest, and baddest, and I suppose I’ve chosen to be involved in something like that too…but Josh has not.

“Well, I had an interview with a ‘bad guy’ today,” I say, a smile at the corners of my mouth.

“No kidding?” he replies with fake surprise, and we laugh. I reach to hug him amid the running water, wet dishes, and dirty sponge and as he holds me, I feel that maybe, for now, it’s enough.