"I Don't Know What's Wrong With Me": Arthur Shawcross and the Neurologist
About ten years after his conviction, a television crew filmed neurologist Jonathan Pincus examining Arthur Shawcross in prison, at the urging of psychiatrist Dorothy Otnow Lewis, who believed brain damage lay behind his crimes.
- Subject
- Arthur Shawcross
- Recorded
- about 2001
- Runtime
- 6:24
Content warning: Refers to the murders of 11 women and to child abuse, in general terms; no graphic detail.
The Interview
This six-minute video is a segment from a television programme, filmed about ten years after Arthur Shawcross's conviction, that followed a neurological examination of him in prison. Shawcross himself speaks only briefly. He jokes that if he goes to hell, "at least I won't be lonely", talks about the film Psycho, and confuses the name of Hitchcock's killer, Norman Bates, with his own, calling him "Arthur Bates". Before the examination he says he does not know what is wrong with him and wonders whether he "was tampered with". During the examination he answers the doctor's questions while scars on his head are examined, and says that "somewhere down the road" he might be able to help somebody else.
Historical Context
In 1972, in Watertown, New York, Shawcross killed two children, a boy aged 10 and a girl aged 8, and was imprisoned for manslaughter. He was paroled in 1987 and settled in Rochester, where he killed women between 1988 and 1989. At his Monroe County trial in 1990 he pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity; the jury convicted him in December 1990 of ten murders. He was later convicted of an eleventh killing in Wayne County, and his sentences totalled 250 years. He died in custody on November 10, 2008.
Circumstances of the Interview
Psychiatrist Dr. Dorothy Otnow Lewis examined Shawcross for the defence before his trial and argued that he had brain damage. According to published accounts, she wanted neurologist Dr. Jonathan Pincus, her long-time collaborator, to examine him, but the defence did not engage him. In the segment the narrator says that Lewis still wanted to prove that Shawcross's brain was seriously damaged, and that the New York State Department of Correctional Services allowed Pincus to conduct a full neurological examination at the prison in Sullivan County.
What the Interview Covers
Lewis recalls Shawcross's head injuries, a blow from a discus and a blow from a sledgehammer. Pincus examines the scars, then points out a white spot in the frontal white matter on an MRI scan that he attributes, "in all likelihood", to head trauma. The camera follows sensory and motor tests: Pincus says Shawcross showed a positive face-hand test and a right Babinski reflex, and that his memory was fine but his concentration was affected, a pattern he links to frontal deficits. He also describes an enlarged fluid space in the temporal lobe, which he considers significant because an EEG showed an abnormal discharge from that area. Pincus then sets out his view that the combination of childhood abuse and brain damage, not either alone, made Shawcross dangerous, and he tells Shawcross so directly.
What Makes the Recording Significant
The segment films the examination Lewis had wanted before the trial, and records Pincus explaining his findings both to the camera and to Shawcross himself. Pincus set out the same theory, that childhood abuse combined with brain damage lies behind murder, in his book Base Instincts: What Makes Killers Kill? (2001). Shawcross's own words here are few, but they show him waiting for a medical explanation of his crimes.
Archival Importance
Brain injury was part of Shawcross's insanity defence in 1990, which the jury rejected. This recording preserves the medical argument as Lewis and Pincus made it a decade later, at a time when research into the brains of violent offenders was attracting wide attention.
Important Caveats
The findings and their meaning are the views of Lewis and Pincus at the time, not settled conclusions; Pincus himself acknowledges in the segment that other people with similar brain damage do not become murderers. The childhood abuse he refers to is Shawcross's own account and is uncorroborated. Shawcross speaks for well under a minute in total; this is not an interview with him in any full sense, and the uploader's title overstates it. The programme, broadcaster and exact date are not identified. Some short exchanges in the examination room are attributed from context only.
Arthur Shawcross: People tell me, say, "You're going to go die and go to hell." At least I won't be lonely.
Narrator: These days, Arthur Shawcross has all the time in the world to sit around and shoot the breeze. He's serving 25 life terms for murder. He likes telling jokes, and if you ask him about the phrase "serial killer", he's got a quick response.
Arthur Shawcross: [unclear: "Ah, corny" / "A corn"]. You should read my poem I wrote on [unclear: "Cals" / "that"; not resolved].
Narrator: He likes talking about movies.
Arthur Shawcross: Psycho. I didn't, I didn't really enjoy, um, the scene there.
Narrator: But he mixes things up, like the name of Hitchcock's killer, Norman Bates.
Arthur Shawcross: You know, maybe because my name is Arthur also. Wait, what was the guy's name? Arthur Bates.
Narrator: It's been 10 years since Shawcross was convicted of killing 11 women in upstate New York. For Dr. Dorothy Lewis, his trial left behind unfinished business.
Dr. Dorothy Otnow Lewis: Let me tell you why I, why I wish you had seen Shawcross at the time of his trial.
Narrator: She still wants to prove that Shawcross's brain is seriously damaged, damage she believes is a root cause of his terrible crimes.
Dr. Dorothy Otnow Lewis: Because I don't think he's ever had a really good neurologic examination. Um, in terms of his history, he had several head injuries. One was a blow to the head from a discus, and a blow to the head with a sledgehammer.
Arthur Shawcross: I don't know what's wrong with me. That's why I'm waiting for Dr. Pincus. Sometimes I wonder, and as ridiculous as it sounds, if I was tampered with [unclear: "in some way" / "with somebody"].
Narrator: The New York State Department of Corrections allowed Dr. Jonathan Pincus to conduct a full neurological exam of Shawcross at his maximum security prison in Sullivan County.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Got a dent right in your [unclear: "head" / "hand"] here.
Arthur Shawcross: Yeah. It's beyond the hairline, so it's hard to see. And there's a big scar over on the other side. See it right there? That's where the [unclear: "discus" / "distance"; not resolved].
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Yeah, there's some scars here.
Narrator: A physical exam provides corroborating evidence for what's also seen in Shawcross's MRIs.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: This white spot right here in the frontal white matter is the part that I was talking about. That's abnormal. Multiple sclerosis could look like that, but there's no history of anything like that. There is a history of head trauma to that part of the brain. That's what the cause of it is, in all likelihood.
Narrator: Another series of tests tell Dr. Pincus how Shawcross's brain is functioning.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: All right, close your eyes and tell me, um, where I touched you, okay?
Arthur Shawcross: Left cheek.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Anywhere else?
Arthur Shawcross: No.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Okay, try again.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: When I touched his face and his arm simultaneously, he only felt it on his face. That was a positive face-hand test. In other words, he's ignored the more distal of two sensory stimuli. He was not concentrating on, on the stimuli.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Palm, fist, side. Palm, fist, side. Can you do it? [unclear: "No, palm first" / "Palm first"; Shawcross's attempt or the doctor's correction]. No, when you do the fist, do it this way. Palm, fist, side. Good.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: His memory is fine. It's his concentration that's affected, and that's the pattern that you see in frontal deficits.
Unidentified: Hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard. You see it? [unclear: "Distorted" / "Just strong"].
Narrator: There seems to be a cyst in the right temporal lobe.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: What's black is spinal fluid, and what's gray is brain in this view, which is like a cut [unclear: "through" / "to"] kind of the middle of the brain. And this black represents spinal fluid. It's, uh, a natural cavity within the brain, but it's too large as compared with the other side. That would ordinarily not be considered significant, except for the fact that there is a spiking discharge on the EEG that identifies that part of the brain, the anterior, the anterior temporal lobe, uh, as being a site of electrical abnormality.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Shawcross had several neurologic abnormalities that were quite significant. The most important of them was that he had a right Babinski reflex. That means when I stroked the bottom of his right foot, the, the big toe went up. Just a slight movement, a few millimeters. Uh, that indicates that there is disease of a major tract in the brain on the opposite side. There's a deficit. There could be no controversy over that. Could be no controversy over that.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: The only issue is what's the relationship between the brain damage, demonstrable brain damage, and the behavior. And, uh, people who think that there is no relationship between them would say that there are other people who have similar brain damage who don't have, or aren't, murderers. I agree with that wholeheartedly. But you take the background of abuse that Arthur Shawcross has had, and combine it with this brain damage, and that's the reason that he is Arthur Shawcross.
Arthur Shawcross: What can you learn from all that?
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: Well, I can, uh, give you a little summary of it.
Arthur Shawcross: [unclear: "I imagine" / "I may just"] somewhere down the road, I might be able to help somebody else.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: That's right. Most people who are abused don't do anything bad. And as a matter of fact, even you, most of the time, you were just looking like an ordinary citizen, behaving like an ordinary citizen. But I think that had you not had brain damage, which you do have, of a neurological kind, I don't think that you would have given in to that urge. If you'd only had brain damage and hadn't had that experience of abuse as a child, I don't think that there would have been any urge to [unclear: "bubble up" / "bottle up" / "babble up"]. But the combination of the neurologic damage, which you [unclear: "unquestionably" / "questionably" / "questioningly"] had, and the terrible experiences in childhood, was what made you dangerous at certain times in your life.
Dr. Jonathan Pincus: And if there is a message, it would be that, uh, the abuse of children is a societal problem. Society has to be interested in that and do something about it.
Narrator: Can new scientific research allow us to look inside the minds of murderers? That's next. ---