[Analysis of criminal acts and forensic evaluation of psychiatric deviance]

The psycho-scientific diagnosis transposed to legal terms defines and limits the extent of the psychic disturbances that have to be considered in the test of criminal responsibility. The analysis of the criminal act that has to be carried out on this basis is of decisive importance. It must place particular emphasis on the automatic nature of structural orientations and their regulation by de-actualization. The psychopathological reference system proposed by Sass can be used to measure the severity of psychic deviance ("abnormality")--the different forms its manifestation can take are treated separately in detail--against acute psychosis and against delusion as two basic patterns of psychopathology. If a severe abnormality is confirmed the analysis of the offence that has to be undertaken independently of psychopathological comparisons must be centred on orientations that are contrary to automatically criminal action. These can be respected or overcome by decisions for which the perpetrator can bear the responsibility, or restricted or negated by psychic impairment. Before the author's concluding remarks on the place of such considerations in the enforcement of disciplinary proceedings, some examples of severe psychic abnormality are treated in detail. They are found more frequently in sexual offenders and those involved in drug-related crimes than in other groups of offenders.