Thursday, August 17, 2006

Presumption of Innocence

Let's all give John Mark Karr something we never gave John and Patsy Ramsey, namely, presumption of innocence.  While it appears that he is a good, credible suspect, it may also be true that he simply became obsessed with the case, and over the years the obsession became pathological.  He may now have so closely identified with the murder emotionally, as to actually believe that he committed the crime, when in fact he may not have.  If this is the case, the psychopathology may have resulted in a frame of mind called a factitious disorder.  I hypothesize that false confession can be a form of factitious disorder, like Munchausen's Syndrome.  There is no clear motive for such behavior other than mental illness.  This is something that needs to be ruled out, in my opinion.  While I still personally believe that an intruder killed JonBenet (Lou Smit's work has proven this to my satisfaction), John Mark Karr may not be that individual.

No comments: