I woke up in the morning. I wasn’t feeling stable. I wasn’t feeling set. I was turning. I was turning. I was there but I was turning. I remember hearing God. God spoke to me. God told me, ‘Go in the room and kill your mother.’ I heard that. 

-RS, after being charged for the murder of his mother

 

I lost my temper, she started to walk away so I hit her in the back of the head with a Gatorade bottle that was laying on the ground, and then I grabbed her around the throat, but she got away and ran down the  dirt path. I tackled her and she landed on her stomach. I then rolled her over and she tried to scratch me, I began slapping her around, and then put my hand over her mouth, I may have done it too long. 

-JD, at the age of 16, confessed to a murder and rape that he did not commit

 

 

The civil and criminal courts of America are filled with these kinds of testimonies. Killers who are so divorced from reality that their actions beggar understanding. Victims whose physical traumas are compounded by deep mental scars – scars that might never heal. 

 

Forensic psychiatrist and Columbia University professor Steven Simring has been an expert witness in dozens of high-profile cases. In criminal courts he has worked for defense lawyers and prosecutors. In civil court, he has assessed emotional damages suffered by victims of gay bashing, sexual abuse and assault, and even botched post-mastectomy reconstructive surgery. Simring doesn’t solve crimes – that’s not his thing. Instead, he’s the guy who helps the lawyers and judges figure out what justice should look like.