Heidenreich, Philip 1

Philip Heidenreich
Dr. Bourke / Dr. Dziech
CJ3001: Kids Who Kill
December 3, 2015
Response 10
Our visit to Hillcrest exposed me to a realm I have never seen. My feelings about the
place are that it is a juxtaposition of confinement, freedom, and a place to presently deal with
both past and future. I was surprised to find no gates, walls, or high security. I was glad to see
that the boys still had enthusiasm, happiness, and energy, even in a place of rehabilitation.
During the experience I was interested and able to see the facility, experience the feel of the
place, and speak to some of the people there. On our way out of Hillcrest, I felt I was leaving a
place of confinement, and reentering the freedom most of our country facilitates. Whenever I
leave after visiting a place of abnormalcybe that a homeless shelter, a juvenile detention
center, or a prisonI cathartically reenter my understanding of normal life. It is a privilege I am
able to partake in.
In Brainwashed, the part of the brain called the Amygdala, which is linked to the
primitive impulses of aggression, anger, and fear, among other emotions, was attributed to
having a connection with criminal behavior, hence the title of chapter five: My Amygdala Made
Me Do It. I think it is interesting how the law deals with impairments and legality. According to
Stephen Morse, a legal scholar, the law cares only whether a causal factor, no matter its nature,
produced impairment so substantial as to deprive people of their rationality. To me that
discounts all other influencers that are not directly causes of an action. Satel and Lillenfeld in
Brainwashed go on to describe some of the characteristics of a psychopath. Emotionless, great

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anger when insulted, masters of manipulation, extremely poor at empathizing, typically regard
the pain or misery theyve inflicted on others as being their problem, not mine, and a
diminished capacity to learn from negative consequences that would ordinarily dampen
aggressive impulses. A chilling statistic on psychopaths is that they are estimated to represent
between 15 and 25 percent of the prison population, and one percent of all people in the general
population.
I read some fascinating things in Brainwashed. When looking at connections between
psychopathic behavior and a humans neurobiology, when examining a person who has already
committed a crime and is in jail, there are three possibilities named in Brainwashed. One, there
could be a brain correspondence that contributes to the crime. Two, the characteristic may have
arisen as a result of being imprisoned. Three, the brains abnormalities could be sheer
coincidence- having no relation or bearing to the crime. Is this a caveat of all neuro-criminal
rearch? Also, when considering the immaturity of a young person, an average nine-year-old
grasps the finality of death. I also like the way Satel and Lillenfeld said brains are bathed in
culture and circumstance. One question that has a lot of gravity to me is asks exactly how
much prefrontal abnormality, unfinished myelination, or overdriving limbic activity is necessary
to support the claim that a defendant could not have exerted self-control, felt no difference
between right and wrong, or was unable to reason cogently? And tying this into the discussion
on freewilldoes neuroscience threaten the notion? And thus free humankind from
responsibility of action?
The next chapter of Brainwashed discusses The Future of Blame and states that if no
one can be blamed, no one is morally deserving of punishment. I feel this chapter goes a little
bit too far, in that they argue against freewill for the majority of the chapter. This notion goes

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against our entire way of life, including in part our entire way of viewing criminality, and of
course the central way our criminal justice system works. Our justice system, and world for that
matter, runs on the idea that we are responsible for our actions be they good, then the person is
considered successful, or bad then the individual is considered criminal or perhaps evil. I like the
way the chapter later goes on to describe this in a more rational and balanced way saying, We
should regard it, perhaps, as a mosaic comprising of black, white and gray elements. And in
the end, it is likely that almost every act emerges from an amalgam of conscious and unconscious
processes that assert themselves to varying degrees under the circumstances at the moment.
Therefore our justice system is set up in response to our actions. The point of punishment is to
make perpetrators suffer in proportion to the harm that they have already caused the victim and
society. In my opinion I dont think we could ever truly achieve that. Especially in the case of a
serious crime. Maybe balance can be achieved in response to petty crimes? The book finishes
saying that in the future neuroscience will be more and more able to distinguish between actions
committed by freewill and those committed without, based on the premise that humans have a
universal hunger for fairness and justice. I think that is true in most cases but definitely not
universally.
The Case for Revenge discusses things in a different way than Brainwashed. Early in the
article it describes George W. Bushs speech after 9/11, noting that he knew this statement would
draw applause: "Ours is a nation that does not seek revenge, but we do seek justice." The text
goes on to propose that justice and revenge are interconnected. After Osama was killed we
cheered out of happiness that justice and revenge had in-part been achieved. The article goes on
to accuse Ghandi and Jesus of being cowards. They both talked accepting their losses without
recourse. Rosenbaum goes on to talk about avengers, and how we resonate with them. We do not

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view an avenger as a murderer, we view them as a person putting justice into their own hands.
John Foreman is named as someone who openly spoke about his willingness to avenge if justice
and institution did not do their part. Rosenbaum says that avengers have no choice but to put the
law into their own hands, because when they came to the law in good faith but found it not to be
fair.
My opinion is sympathetic to an avenger, but I do not think that is the best option. The
person who can forgive and not demand justice I believe is living to a higher standard, one in the
lines more with Ghandi and Jesus than Bruce Wayne. I resonate with those who feel the need for
revenge, justice and law to be fair. The problem is that when an individual has raped and
murdered tens or people, no matter the age, there is no amount of punishment that would truly be
fair. The only way to move on in a healthy way is to lock that person up, keeping them from
doing anything more, and forgiving them. Otherwise you are holding yourself hostage, never
allowing yourself to move back to normalcy. Individuals who committed murder between the age
of 5 and 17 I view in the exact same way. If they are proven to be unable to be rehabilitated, and
are likely to reoffend, then they should be locked up indefinitely. The victim and others hurt by
the perpetrator need to forgive and move on. In the case of murder their punishment should
certainly be significant. Neurobiological and environmental caveats aside, I hope that future
neuro-criminal research will be able to reveal more clearly if a person is going to reoffend and
then allow our justice system to let that be the determiner of their sentence. This is the opinion I
have come to after these readings, visiting Hillcrest, and partaking on the adventure this class led
me through.