Hickey's Trauma Control Model Of The Serial Killer

Hickey (1997), in his trauma control model of the serial killer, argues that various factors can contribute to criminality and in particular to serial homicide. These factors can be biological, developmental, demographic or familial, including childhood trauma (Hickey, 1997, as cited in Miller, 2014, p17). Hickey’s model includes 8 elements – Predispositional factors, Traumatic events, Low self-esteem and fantasies, Increasingly violent fantasies, Trauma reinforces, Facilitators, Dissociation and Homicidal behaviour (Hickey, 2016, p149).
Hickey believes that it is unlikely that any one of these factors alone is responsible for homicidal tendencies but suggests that it can be a combination of factors. He argues that a person is no more likely

to be born a killer than they are to acquire murderous tendencies through watching violent television programmes (Hickey, 2016, p148). Hickey suggests that while there may be a number of predispositional factors that influence serial killers, it may require an event or number of events/traumas, acting over time, to cause a person to commit murder. He says that while some male violent offenders have been identified as having an extra Y-chromosome, which may have contributed to their violent behaviour, there are some men who possess this extra chromosome and never become violent (Hickey, 2016, p148). Hickey refers to the events that influence the serial killer as ‘traumatisations’, and these traumatisations include various negative events that typically occur in the early formative years. They include unstable home life, physical and sexual abuse etc. (Hickey, 2016, p148). Eth and Pynoos (1985), identified a number of effects of childhood traumatisation. These include images of violent mutualisation and revenge fantasies (Eth & Pynoos, 1985, as cited in Hickey, 2016, p149). In a study by Lang and DeWitt (1990), of 165 motiveless murders, committed since the year 1600 to the present, it was found that many of the serial killers studied had suffered from some type of head injury or organic brain pathology and suggested that these conditions can, at times, give rise to abnormal brain activity which may lead to compulsive autonomic behaviour (Lang & DeWitt, 1990, as cited in Hickey, 2016, pp148-149). The serial killer John Wayne Gacy sustained a head injury from a swing at 11 years of age, which caused a blood clot that wasn’t discovered until the age of 16, when he experienced blackouts (Sanmartin, 2001, as cited in Reid, 2017). The killer, Henry Lee Lucas, had suffered multiple head injuries as a result of parental abuse when he was a child (Norris, 1991, as cited in Reid, 2017).
Hickey suggests that it is not the brain trauma in itself that causes the sufferer to become violent as not everybody with these traumas becomes violent.

He proposes that it is the trauma in conjunction with outside factors such as social or environmental, which exacerbate the problem and leads to the criminal activity (Hickey, 2016, p149). Hickey says that the most common trauma experienced by serial killers is childhood traumatisation caused by rejection and that this rejection can be in the form of rejection by family members or an unstable/abusive home life (Hickey, 2016, p148). Hickey says that rejection by family members, e.g. relatives or parents, is the most common cause of childhood traumatisation and that an unstable, abusive home has been proposed as a major form of rejection (Hickey, 2016, p149). Holmes, Tewksbury and Holmes (1999), in their ‘fractured identity syndrome’ theory of serial murder, suggest that serial killers are similar to everyone else in the early years of personality development and lead normal lives. They argue that an event or series of events that often take place in the serial murderer’s adolescent years, causes a fracturing of the personality and that this fracturing, following subsequent incidents, causes the fracture to explode into a

damaged
personality (Holmes, Tewksbury & Holmes, 1999). While most people can cope constructively with rejection, some individuals can only cope in a destructive manner. Children who eventually become serial killers, Hickey says, have experienced childhood trauma that they were unable to overcome by therapeutic interventions (Hickey, 2016, p150). These childhood traumas result in feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem and can result in a process of dissociation (Hickey, 2016, p150). He says that, “In an effort to regain the psychological equilibrium taken from them by people in authority, serial offenders appear to construct masks, facades, or a veneer of self-confidence and self-control” (Hickey, 2016, p150). Hickey notes that the serial killer may supress traumatic events, to the extent that they cannot remember these events. He refers to this phenomenon as ‘splitting off’ or blocking out the trauma, resulting in dissociation (Hickey, 2016, p151). When this happens, serial offenders appear to create an image of self-assuredness and self-control and over time develop an unconscious false image that he/she is in control. A conflict arises between pretence and reality, which he/she is incapable of resolving. Traumatic events are supressed, resulting in an inability to recall the experience (Hickey, 2016, pp150, 151). Tanay (1976) suggests that the murderer is committing his crime in a state of altered consciousness. He is faced with a psychological conflict that cannot be resolved, and this results in part of his personality losing touch with reality (Tanay, 1976, as cited in Hickey, 2016, p151).
Danto (1982), on the other hand, viewed dissociation as a type of anxiety, triggered when the mind becomes over-whelmed with anxiousness (Danto, 1982, p6, as cited in Hickey, 2016, p151). When this happens, the serial killer, in order to prevent a mentally painful experience, may supress the hurt and other painful feelings associated with the trauma, while not consciously supressing the fact that the trauma happened (Danto, 1982, as cited in Hickey, 2016, p151). In a study by Ensink et al. (2017), that examined the link between childhood sexual abuse and subsequent internalising, externalising and sexualised behaviour problems in children, it was found that dissociation was a frequent feature linking psychosexual difficulties in children to earlier child sexual abuse (Ensink et al., 2017).
Hickey’s Trauma-Control Model, suggests that serial murder would have its origins in childhood, and as such, perpetrators would have a long history of criminal activity (Arndt, Hietpas & Kim, 2004). Studies suggest that most sexually motivated murderers were in their 20s, with a mean age of 28 years (Hickey, 1991, as cited in Arndt, Hietpas & Kim, 2004) and most operated in the age range of 16-48 years (Hickey, 1991, as cited in Arndt, Hietpas & Kim, 2004). In a study by Weatherby, Buller and McGinnis (2009), that tried to identify possible predictors of a serial killer, they used four known serial killers (Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, Gary Ridgway and John Wayne Gacy Jr.). In keeping with Hickey’s Trauma Control Model, the authors found sexual fantasy during childhood to be common to all four killers. However, only 2 of the subjects acknowledged abuse during childhood (psychological abuse in the case of Gary Ridgway and physical, sexual, psychological and witnessed abuse in the case of John Gacy) (Weatherby, Buller and McGinnis (2009). Although the sample population in the study was small (4 subjects), this finding, nevertheless, conflicts with Hickey’s 2016 Trauma Control Model that suggests that abuse is a destabilising event that occurs during the early years of the serial killer’s life (Hickey, 2016, p148).
Hickey’s (1997) Trauma Control Model suggests that for serious sexual compulsion to become actual acts of homicide, they must be activated by sociocultural facilitators, for example, sexually violent video games or internet pornography, which glorify violence and objectify women (Hickey, 1997, as cited in Miller, 2014, p17). Use of these facilitators precipitates the urge to kill and the serial killer starts to act out his fantasies – these can be the precursors to an actual killing. These fantasies become stronger and more addictive and eventually lose their ability to satisfy (Arndt, Hietpas, & Kim, 2004, p120). The sadistic serial child killer, Westley Allan Dodd, began exposing himself to other young children at the age of thirteen. This behaviour developed into child molestation and Dodd eventually ended up molesting and murdering three victims (King, 1993, as cited in Hickey, 2016, p200). At one point, Dodd reported that exposing himself “wasn’t fun anymore. I needed more physical contact. I started tricking kids into touching me. Then that wasn’t fun anymore, so I started molesting kids” (Fox & Levin, 2000, p36, as cited in Arndt, Hietpas, & Kim, 2004, p120). In the final phase of Hickey’s Trauma-Control Model, when fantasy has become reality, murder becomes an addiction. However, because each murder does not completely eliminate negative feelings held by the killer, a never-ending cycle of murder begins and this is accompanied by increased frequency and viciousness of the murders (Arndt, Hietpas, & Kim, 2004, p120).
While Hickey’s trauma-control model incorporates a cyclical nature to serial murder, Del Fabbro (2006) suggests that there is an over-analysis on the offender’s childhood and insufficient explanation of the offender’s development in adulthood. While the offender’s development is ongoing, there is no discussion on how the killer’s fantasies and crimes change over time, or on the impact of environment and context at the time the offence is committed (Del Fabbro, 2006). With regard to childhood traumatisation, a study of 77 male serial killers found that more than 50% (49 children) had suffered the trauma of rejection and approximately 50% (38 children) had suffered the trauma of an unstable home (Hickey, 2016, p279). Coinciding with early childhood trauma, suggested by Hickey’s Trauma Control Model, it would be expected that serial murderers would have a long criminal history. In a review of 211 male serial killers, Hickey (2016) found that most offenders examined had some form of criminal history (Hickey, 2016, pp276, 279).
While Hickey’s 2002 Trauma-Control Model follows the serial killer from childhood to the end of his killing career, its main application is to sexually motivated murders (Arndt, Hietpas & Kim, 2004).