Modus operandi and personality disorder in incarcerated spousal killers.

Previous studies of uxoricide (wife murder) have tended to focus on the ratio of uxoricide to femicide (killing of women), prior histories of physical abuse, use of excessive force (“overkill”), and the role of estrangement as risk factors. However, little attention has been directed toward personality disorder in perpetrators of uxoricide and whether personality disorder relates to the modus operandi pattern of the murder. Campbell (1992) found that 28 of 65 femicides in Ohio were uxoricides. Of these, 18 of 28 (68%) had recorded histories of previous physical abuse, and 17 of 28 (61%) used “excessive force” during the killing. Wolfgang (1956) had found that 44 of 53 husbands who killed their wives did so with excessive force. His definition of excessive force was two or more separate actions of stabbing, cutting, or shooting, involved in the process of slaying the victim. Cooper (1994) also reported excessive force as frequent (51% of cases of uxoricide). In a study of 896 woman killings (femicides) with identified perpetrators in Ontario from 1974 to 1990, Crawford and Gartner (1992) found that 551 (62%) were killed by intimate partners. Of all femicides where a motive for the killing could be established from police records, 32% were “estrangement killings”, another 11% were based on beliefs that the female partner was sexually unfaithful, a variation of the abandonment fear without actual physical estrangement (Dutton, 1995). Crawford and Gartner (1992) also reported excessive force as frequent (60% of uxoricides). Crawford and Gartner (1992) found that 551 of 896 (62%) of femicides in Ontario were uxoricides. Of the uxoricides, 297 had prior recorded histories of domestic violence, 166 had records of threats to the