Predictive Validity of Operationalized Criteria for the Assessment of Criminal Responsibility of Sexual Offenders With Paraphilic Disorders-A Randomized Control Trial With Mental Health and Legal Professionals.

The prevention of sexual violence is a major goal of sexual health. In cases of accused sexual offenders, the assessment of diminished criminal responsibility of the accused is one of the most important procedures undertaken by experts in the German legal system. This assessment follows a two-stage method assessing first the severity of a paraphilic disorder and then second criteria for or against diminished capacity. The present study examines the predictive validity of two different sets of criteria for the assessment of criminal responsibility in the context of paraphilic disorders combined with sexual offending. Two exemplary case vignettes of two suspected sexual offenders were developed to assess the criteria. For each participant, one of the two exemplary case vignettes was randomly presented. The presentation of the two different sets of criteria was also randomized, so that each participant was assigned only one of the two criteria sets to rate one of the presented cases.

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Copyright © 2020 Dobbrunz, Daubmann, Müller and Briken.

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The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.