„Affektdelikte“ revisited: ein Abgesang auf die „tiefgreifende Bewusstseinsstörung“

Since 1983, Henning Saß has established systematic order in the multifaceted phenomenon of affective delicts/crimes with his work, fundamentally structuring the psychiatric discourse on criminal responsibility and thereby restricting the room for individual (“normative”) legal empathy for offenders in such cases. He postulated two lists of characteristics, the first one gathering characteristics that indicate affective crimes and signs of possible diminished responsibility based on the literature. The second list is innovative as Saß postulated it independently, gathering characteristics that speak against the subject/offender having a pervasive consciousness disorder. Despite the distinct and distinguishing character of the lists and terms mentioned in them, he insists that one must appraise the case as a whole, considering the crime history and personalities of offender and victim.

It seems (only) plausible to go beyond this approach by giving up the belief that an unpredictable, temporary, impulsive and untameable affect realistically depicts the end of a conflictual romantic relationship, that (this) one single “affect” should serve as the only ground to assess someone’s criminal responsibility. Similarly, the change seen in criminalistic investigations calls for a broader approach: with the universal use of smartphones, there has come an extensive tool for documenting the course of a relationship (e.g., chat histories), including the offender’s and the victim’s perspective, in foro making the objection of a sudden and overpowering deed a rare one. Thereby, however, the flaws of the notion of a “conscience disorder” become visible, a notion that, contrary to the three other requirements necessary for diagnosing diminished or abrogated liability, has no empirical psychiatric fundament.