Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work (42 page)

his cough as the tones went through. “Oh my God, Denise. They didn’t!” he exclaimed, when Denise answered.

“Yes, Dave, it just happened. We don’t know why,” she said, holding back tears.

Dave asked what she had heard, and she told him all she knew.

He had many questions and seemed to relish every detail Denise could provide. Dave assured her that things were going to be okay and then they hung up.

Dave breathed deeply, enjoying the fresh air, and then dialed Jack Garrideb. “Hi, Jack. How did it go?”

“As well as could be expected,” answered Jack, wearily. “Word will travel fast, I’m sure.”

“Yeah, Denise just called me, lots of folks in shock, apparently.

Anything about me?” asked Dave in anticipation.

“Nothing yet. I’ll have HR send you the draft announcement about your promotion for you to review. You may want to add in more about your background. Get it back to the communications department by Monday. We’ll release it on Tuesday, after things quiet down a bit.”

“Yes, certainly,” assured Dave.

Dave hung up the phone and smiled. He poured himself another glass of wine and walked to the edge of the deck. He gazed out over his yard and silently toasted the oak with the dead limb.

“Sometimes you just have to cut out the deadwood,” he said aloud, taking a sip. “Life is good.”

NOTES

Numbers in boldface indicate page locations.

5
“Nice Suit.” Special thanks to Dr. Michael Walton, a UK based Char-tered Psychologist, for providing material for this case.

18
“Psychopathy, Sociopathy, and Antisocial Personality Disorder” American Psychiatric Association. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th ed. Washington, D.C.: Author, 1994.

20
“A pioneer in the early years . . .” Cleckley, H. The Mask of Sanity, 5th ed. St. Louis: Mosby, 1976.

22
“He describes these efforts . . .” Hare, R. D. Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us. New York: Guilford Press, 1998.

24
“Nature? Nurture? Both!” Blonigen, D. M., Carlson, S. R., Krueger, R. F., & Patrick, C. J. A twin study of self-reported psychopathic personality traits. Personality and Individual Differences, 35(1), 179–197, 2003.

24
“Nature? Nurture? Both!” Larrson, H., Andershed, H., & Lichstenstien, P. A genetic factor explains most of the variation in the psychopathic personality. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 115(2), 221–230, 2006.

324

Notes

24
“Nature? Nurture? Both!” Viding, E., Blair, R. J. R., Moffitt, T. E., & Plomin, R. Evidence for substantial genetic risk for psychopathy in 7-year-olds. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 46(6), 592–597, 2005.

25
“The most reliable, valid . . .” Hare, R. D. Manual for the Revised Psychopathy Checklist, 2nd ed. Toronto, Ontario: Multi-Health Systems, 2003.

26
“. . . the shorter PCL: Screening Version . . .” Hart, S. D., Cox, D. N.,

& Hare, R. D. Manual for the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL: SV). Toronto, Ontario: Multi-Health Systems, 1995.

For additional information about biological and genetic research on psychopathy, see www.Hare.org.

42
“When Bad is Good” Bing, S. What Would Machiavelli Do? New York: HarperCollins, 2000.

54
“Consider these words by Jack Abbott . . .” Abbott, J. In the Belly of the Beast: Letters from Prison. New York: Random House, 1981.

55
“In several functional magnetic resonance. . . .” Kiehl, K. A., Smith, A. M., Hare, R. D., Mendrek, A., Forster, B. B., Brink, J., & Liddle, P. F. Limbic abnormalities in affective processing by criminal psychopaths as revealed by functional magnetic resonance imaging. Biological Psychiatry, 50(9), 677–684, 2001.

56
“Praise the Lord” Hare, R. D. The psychopathic offender. Presentation at the Judicial Symposium on Child Sexual Abuse, Bethel, Maine, May 11–12, 1995.

65
“On a recent Oprah Winfrey program . . .” Bird, A. Blood Brother: 33

Reasons My Brother Scott Peterson is Guilty. New York: ReganBooks, 2005.

66
“Where Was the Emotional Connection?” Curtis, K. “Scott Peterson: Portrait of a Psychopath.” (The Associated Press). The Desert Sun, March 20, 2005.

76
“Giving Them What They Want” Steinbeck, J. East of Eden. New York: Viking Press, 1952.

89
“On Sunday he prayed . . .” On Sunday he prayed on his knees, on Monday he preyed on his fellow man. Vancouver Sun, May 20, 2000.

Notes

325

92
“I Felt Like I Was Lunch” Meloy, J. R., & Meloy, M. J. Autonomic arousal in the presence of psychopathy: A survey of mental health and criminal justice professionals. Journal of Threat Assessment, 2(2), 21–34, 2003.

94
“The Corporation as Psychopath” The Corporation. A film by Mark Achbar, Jennifer Abbott, & Joel Bakman.

94
“The Corporation as Psychopath” Babiak, P., & Hare, R. D. The B-Scan 360: Research Version. Toronto, Ontario: Multi-Health Systems, 2005.

118
“The Psychopath in the Next Cubicle” Adams, S. Dilbert. Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2002.

124
“The Dark Triad” Nathanson, C., Paulhus, D. L., & Williams, K. M.

Predictors of a behavioral measure of scholastic cheating: Personality and competence but not demographics. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 31(1), 97–122, 2006.

124
“The Dark Triad” Paulhus, D., Hemphill, J., & Hare, R. D. (in press). The SRP-III. Toronto, Ontario: Multi-Health Systems.

135
“Corporate Fraud in the Boardroom” Skalak, S., Nestler, C., & Buss-mann, K. Global Economic Crime Survey, 2005. PricewaterhouseCoopers

Special thanks to Michael MacDougall, MBA, MEd, former Director of PricewaterhouseCooper’s Centre for Career Management (Vancouver) for his assistance.

141
“Power Freaks” Weiner, D. L. Power Freaks: Dealing with Them in the Workplace or Anyplace. New York: Prometheus Books, 2002. A prolific writer on business and psychology, David Weiner is also the author of Battling the Inner Dummy: The Craziness of Apparently Normal People, Brain Tricks: Coping with Your Defective Brain, and Reality Check: What Your Mind Knows, but Isn’t Telling You.

163
“But I’m Not as Bad as the Others” National Post, September 15, 2005.

178
“Disordered Personalities at Work” Board, B. J., & Fritzon, K. Disordered personalities at work. Psychology, Crime and Law, 11(1), 17–32, 2005.

185
“Variations on a Theme” Hervé, Hugues, F.M. The Masks of Sanity and Psychopathy: A cluster analytical investigation of subtypes of criminal psychopathy. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, 2003.

326

Notes

187
“They Just Don’t Get It” Erin McClam, The Associated Press, June 21, 2005.

190
“Researcher Paul Frick and his colleagues . . .” Frick, P. J., & Marsee, M. A. (2006). Psychopathy and developmental pathways to antisocial behavior in youth. In C. J. Patrick (Ed.), Handbook of Psychopathy. New York: Guilford Press. Frick et al.

190
“Donald Lynam and his colleagues . . .” Lynam, D. R., & Derefinko, K. J. (2006). Psychopathy and personality. In C. J. Patrick (Ed.), Handbook of Psychopathy (pp. 133–155). New York: Guilford Press. Lynam et al.

195
“The Dark Side of Charisma” Hogan, R., Raskin, R., & Fazzini, D.

“The Dark Side of Charisma.” In K. E. Clark & M. B. Clark (eds.), Measures of Leadership (pp. 343–354). West Orange: Leadership Li-brary of America, Inc., 1990.

211
“Fictional Resumes” Peterson, M. “A resume distinguished by what it didn’t mention.” New York Times, September 6, 2001.

214
“Faking It” Eichenwald, K. and Kolata, G. “A Doctor’s Drug Trials Turn Into Fraud.” New York Times, May 17, 1999.

228
“
The Emotional Disconnect” Abbott, J. (with Zack, N.). My Return.

Buffalo NY: Prometheus Books, 1987. King County Sheriff’s Office, DVD on Interrogation of Gary Ridgeway. Seattle, WA, 2003
.

230
“B-Scan” For more information about research with the B-Scan, see www.B-Scan.com.

232
“Look Me in the Eye” Enron Annual Report, 1998.

237
“ ‘Please God, Help Me Plunder’ ” Barrow, B. “The Cartier Lifestyle of a Secretary who Stole from Bosses.” The Daily Telegraph, January 21, 2004. Wordsworth, A. “Honest Greed.” National Post, April 21, 2004.

287
“Love Fraud” For more information, see www.LoveFraud.com.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

When I met my first psychopath, I was a young industrial-organizational psychologist finding my way as a consultant who had stum-bled upon something that was troubling. Robert D. Hare responded to my call for guidance, and our working relationship has grown since into a valued friendship. Working with Bob on this book has only strengthened my respect for his scientific rigor, subtle wit, and warm sense of humor.

The manuscript of this book would not have passed muster without the able critiques of Marian Babiak and Dr. John Babiak, who never held back their probing questions and insightful advice.

The inspiration of Drs. H. Karl Springob, ABPP, and Paul W.

Thayer, advisers from years past, continues to reassure me that personality is a critically important part of business performance, and education and personal awareness are the keys to improvement.

A special thanks to my mother, Mrs. Julia Babiak, for her continued and unending love and support. Joan Bedard, my life partner, made writing far easier than expected by providing the love, support,
328

Acknowledgments

and encouragement I needed to get the job done. I am forever thankful to her for making each day an adventure.

Paul Babiak

New York, 2006

During my years of research on psychopathy, I have had the privilege of working with many outstanding students and colleagues. I thank them all. Since I began work in this area four decades ago, things have changed dramatically. Instead of a few academics and clinicians working in isolation, there now are many hundreds of researchers around the world, many in contact with one another and all dedicated to understanding the nature and implications of psychopathy. A significant event was the recent formation of the Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy (SSSP), an organization that will do much to facilitate international and interdisciplinary collaboration in the study of psychopathy and its impact on society.

Scientific research and debate and their applications to mental health and criminal justice certainly are important, but at the same time, the general public must learn as much as it can about psychopathy. It was for this reason that I wrote Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us. My editor for the book was Judith Regan, publisher of the current volume. While writing Without Conscience, I had my first discussions with Paul Babiak. He had provided me with a case study which I included in a chapter on “White Collar Psychopaths.” Since then, I have had the great pleasure of working with Paul on a number of projects, one of which is this book.

I would like to thank Kylie Neufeld for her able assistance with my research and writing endeavors over the past decade. My wife and best friend, Averil, continues to provide me with a nurturing environment, sound counsel, trenchant insights, and enlightened debates about things of importance. Our beloved daughter, Cheryl, taught us much about courage, dignity, and grace in the face of adversity.

Robert D. Hare

Vancouver, 2006

INDEX

abandonment phase, of manipulation, 53–58

messages communicated in, 74–79

confrontation, 139

potential gains leading to, 43–44

in corporate environment, 137–40

psychological defenses and, 44–45

irresponsibility and, 56–57

psychopathic traits evident in, 45–48

lacking empathy and, 54–56

reinforcing victim persona in, 74–78

lacking guilt/remorse and, 53

attributed personality. See reputation psychopathic traits evident in, 53–58

(attributed personality)

reasons for, 53

Abbot, Jack, 54, 228

backgrounds, checking, 237

abuse

Bernardo, Paul, 226–27

intimidation deterring reporting, 52

Bing, Stanley, 43

reporting, 285–86, 313

Bird, Anne, 65, 67

Adelphia Communications fraud, 187

blame. See responsibility, avoiding

adolescent-limited aggression, 190

bonds, with psychopaths

advertising jobs, 210

avoiding, 280–81

affective domain, 27

forging process, 74–79

affinity fraud, 86–87, 90–92

bosses. See also hiring executives; leadership; aggression

managing

inability to act without, 258

desired traits in, 180

origin of, 190–91

from hell, 179–81

Andersen, Donna, 287

psychopathic, handling, 303–11

anger/vindication, 288–89

supervisor style study, 179–80

antisocial domain, 27

brain imaging/responses, 26, 55, 184

antisocial personality disorder (APD), 19

B-Scan, 230–31

ascension phase, 140–41

bullies. See also corporate psychopaths; assessing psychopathy. See psychopathic traits corporate psychopaths, handling

assessment phase, of manipulation, 43–48, non-psychopathic, 189–90

74–76

origin of aggression, 190–91

attractive targets for, 44

traits of, 188–90

determining potential gain in, 43–44, 74

understanding company policies about,