Arluke Arnold, Lankford Adam, Madfis Eric
Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA.
Department of Criminology & Criminal Justice, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, USA.
Behav Sci Law. 2018 Nov;36(6):739-751. doi: 10.1002/bsl.2385. Epub 2018 Oct 10.
Researchers have extensively studied the tendency of certain violent criminals to hurt or torture animals, primarily focusing on domestic abusers and serial killers. However, little is known about the extent or nature of prior animal abuse among active shooters and public mass shooters. Public mass and active shooters essentially represent a single offender type: they are people who commit rampage attacks in public places and attempt to harm multiple victims beyond a single target. The only difference is that "mass" shootings are traditionally defined as cases resulting in the death of four or more victims, while "active" shootings have no minimum threshold. This study aimed to identify all publicly reported cases of active and mass shooters who engaged in animal cruelty, describe the nature of their violence toward animals and humans, and examine how they differ from other perpetrators without this history. Overall, this study found 20 cases of offenders with a publicly reported history of animal abuse. Comparisons between offenders with and without this history indicated that animal-abusing offenders were more likely to be young and White, less likely to die at the crime scene, and more likely to kill and wound a large number of victims. While this finding supports the idea that animal abuse might be a warning sign for a small but deadly minority of mostly youthful offenders, it is likely not a robust signal of future shooters in general because animal abuse is rarely reported in this population of offenders at large.
研究人员广泛研究了某些暴力罪犯伤害或折磨动物的倾向，主要集中在家庭暴力者和连环杀手身上。然而，对于活跃射手和公共大规模射手之前虐待动物的程度和性质，人们知之甚少。公共大规模射手和活跃射手本质上代表了同一种犯罪类型：他们是在公共场所实施狂暴袭击并试图伤害多个受害者而非单一目标的人。唯一的区别是，传统上“大规模”枪击案被定义为导致四名或更多受害者死亡的案件，而“活跃”枪击案则没有最低受害者数量门槛。本研究旨在识别所有公开报道的涉及动物虐待的活跃射手和大规模射手案件，描述他们对动物和人类的暴力行为性质，并研究他们与其他没有这种过往经历的犯罪者有何不同。总体而言，本研究发现了20起有公开报道的动物虐待历史的犯罪者案件。有和没有这种历史的犯罪者之间的比较表明，虐待动物的犯罪者更可能是年轻人且为白人，在犯罪现场死亡的可能性较小，并且更有可能杀死和打伤大量受害者。虽然这一发现支持了动物虐待可能是一小部分但致命的、大多为年轻犯罪者的警告信号这一观点，但它可能并非未来射手的一个有力信号，因为在这类犯罪者群体中，动物虐待情况很少被报告。
