Stalking behavior in an organic lesion.

talking is a new crime but an old behavior. For as Racine wrote in 1667 "The heart that no longer loves passionately, must with fury hate". (Androsmache, I. Trans. Robert Henderson). Stalking refers to repeated unwanted attempts to contact or communicate with the object of attention. Forensic psychiatry has given sparse attention to the phenomenon of stalking and is an area of psychiatry that is currently overlooked. Stalkers have a range of motivations, from reasserting power over a partner who rejected them, to the quest for a loving relationship. 1 Most stalkers are lonely and socially incompetent, but all have the capacity to frighten and distress their victims. One in 20 women will be stalked during their lifetime. The majority of the victims are female, while the offenders are usually male. Stalking behaviors range from surveillance to threatening aggressive or violent acts. 2 The majority of stalking relates to failed intimate relationships. Stalkers may also suffer from erotomania or obsessional love with a primary psychiatric diagnosis. Few studies have investigated the behavior of stalkers. 3 This article aims to give the first follow-up of stalking behavior secondary to an arteriovenous malformation. This report summarizes the case history of a 27-year-old man who was transferred from prison to a medium secure hospital in August 1996 under Section 48/49 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (Section 48/49 is a transfer order made in respect of the sentenced offender by the Crown Court and the patient cannot be discharged, transferred to another hospital or granted leave of absence without the consent of the Home Secretary). It transpired that he had been stalking a 28-year old woman neighbor for several months. Six weeks before his admission he was arrested by police officers for making a forced entry into his neighbor's flat. He claimed that the neighbor was his fiancée and that they were going to live together. He had been diagnosed as having grand mal epilepsy 5 years earlier and it was reported that in the months before the offense he had been having a seizure every 2 weeks. He was subsequently convicted and returned to hospital under Section 37 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (Section 37 is a hospital order made in respect of the offender by the Crown Court without any restrictions and the responsible medical officer can discharge or grant leave of absence). At that time he appeared euthymic in …