Carl Dean Peters pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual assault and to four charges of indecency by contact. The victim was his ten-year-old granddaughter.
Peters was eligible for probation. Peters's treating psychiatrist of eighteen months, Dr. Collier Cole, testified in the sentencing phase that Peters's therapy was progressing well. Peters attended all of his sessions, empathized with the victim, removed himself from tempting situations. Dr. Cole further discussed ways to restrict sex offenders on probation.
Dr. Cole concluded that Peters was not a pedophile, but rather, an incest offender. Peters had admitted that, twenty years prior, he also sexually molested the victim's mother—his adopted daughter. Incest offenders, Dr. Cole said, usually commit offenses only within the family.
“That Stuff Is Irrelevant”
Dr. Cole then sought to testify that only three percent of properly treated incest offenders recidivate. The numbers were higher for other categories of offenders. Dr. Cole offered the statistics from a Vermont study cited in a corrections journal.[1]
The prosecution objected. “[A]ny percentages,” prosecution argued at voir dire of the witness, “based on the group of sex offenders and how they do on probation or how they are treated or any of that stuff is irrelevant to this proceeding right here.”
“Well, he can't predict whether this man is going to reoffend or not,” the court agreed. “And I guess [the prosecution] has a point. It doesn't matter what other people do or have done that matters. It matters what his punishment should be. So I will sustain that objection. . . .”
But on cross before the jury, the prosecution began to ask about other offenders. “Dr. Cole, why would a convicted sex offender who is a situation molester [appellant's category], why would they not be allowed to be around children?”
“That is a common condition of probation for all sex offenders,” Dr. Cole replied. It just makes good sense. . . . To remove any possibility for any sort of problems. . . . Total risk reduction.”
The prosecution then asked about the cyclical nature of the sex offender. “Would you agree with me it's kind of like a pendulum swinging back and forth?”
“Certainly can, yes,” Dr. Cole replied, “untreated most definitely.”
Prosecution Cracked Door Open
“Would you agree with me,” prosecution asked, “that the risk of reoffending would be drastically reduced, the risk of reoffending against small, young, female children would be drastically reduced if someone was removed from a setting or placed in a setting where there are no young female children?”
“Correct,” Dr. Cole said. “That puts them on hold for a period of time without treatment.”
Finally, the prosecution asked Dr. Cole about incarcerated sex offenders. “Are you aware of any programs that the Texas Department of corrections offers to sex offenders who are incarcerated?”
I was chairman of the sex offender program, so I am very much aware of what's going on in the prison system right now. . . . The Texas Department of Corrections has done their own study to show that the reoffense rate for sex offenders in their treatment program is less than 10 percent.
Defense counsel pursued this line on redirect. “And if treated, less than 10 percent reoffend; is that what you said? Is that correct?”
“Correct,” Dr. Cole said.
“About my client's specific [sex offender] category, what percent reoffend once they have been treated?” The defense was attempting to elicit the three-percent figure discussed in voir dire.
Prosecution objected, and the court sustained.
“He opened the door when he asked that question on recross,” argued defense counsel.
“Sustained,” the court ruled. “You can ask your next question.”
The jury dealt Peters thirty-five years for the aggravated sexual assault and fifteen years for each of the four indecency offenses.
Peters appealed to the Court of Appeals of Texas, First District. The Court of Appeals first held that the Texas law controlling admissibility of evidence at punishment[2] “grants wide latitude in the admission of evidence deemed relevant.”
“The probative value of the Vermont study was great,” the Court continued. “It bore heavily on one of the ultimate punishment-stage issues in this and every contested case in which probation is sought—whether to imprison the defendant or give him probation. It would have helped the jury determine whether appellant was a suitable probation candidate or might reoffend, issues the State raised by eliciting on cross-examination. . . .”
Ruling: Portion of the judgment assessing punishment reversed. Remanded for a new punishment hearing.
Footnotes:
See Eric Lotke,
Sex Offenders: Does Treatment Work?, CORRECTIONS COMPENDIUM 21 (1996).
See Tex. Code Crim. P. art. 37.07 § 3(a).
| Robert Prentky, Ph.D. Director of Assessment and Modular Unit Director |
As a group, incest offenders are as heterogeneous as non-incest child molesters. It would thus be misleading to draw inferences and makes decisions about incest offenders under the assumption that they constitute a coherent, cohesive group.
Prentky: Peters v. Texas raises a number of interesting questions regarding the classification of Mr. Peters as an incest offender and the assumptions about risk to recidivate deriving from that classification.
It is clear that, as a group, incest offenders are as heterogeneous as non-incest child molesters. It would thus be misleading, if not specious, to draw inferences and makes decisions about incest offenders under the assumption that they constitute a coherent, cohesive group. Nevertheless, incest offenders are invariably referred to as if they were a homogeneous group and very few attempts have been made to develop any classification system, clinical or empirical, that would differentiate among them. Indeed, the only classification system known to this writer, a clinically-derived model without validation, was reported by Summit and Kryso[1] over twenty years ago. Summit and Kryso described ten very different types of incest offenders, only one of which conforms to the “profile” generally thought of by the lay (and legal) community.
There are many other “types” of incest offenders, some of whom pose higher risks of sexual recidivism.
Classic Incest Offender Profile
The profile of this classic incest offender, referred to by Summit and Kryso as the True Endogamous [within marriage] Incest case, appears to be a relatively well-adjusted individual in many areas of his life (such as work, community activities, avocational pastimes, etc.). Disappointments, failures, and stressful life events contribute to role distortion in which the father eroticizes his relationship with his daughter. The mother, for her part, is often disillusioned with the relationship and dissatisfied with her husband. The more that she disengages from the relationship, the more she leaves a vacuum to be filled by her daughter. The daughter gradually assumes many of her mother’s familial roles, such as preparing dinner and satisfying her father’s ego needs. Boundaries become increasingly blurry and limits increasingly bent until the daughter becomes her father’s surrogate “lover.” For this individual, with no history of sexualizing children outside of the immediate family, and with family “dynamics” hypothesized to be of considerable importance in assessing risk, the likelihood of reoffense against other children is quite low. The literature suggests that for these individuals, the short-term reoffense rates (two to three years) are generally ten percent or less.
As Summit and Kryso pointed out, however, there are many other “types” of incest offenders, some of whom pose higher risks of sexual recidivism. At least three of the other types described by Summit and Kryso would be hypothesized to be at substantially higher risk than the True Endogamous offender. The Pedophilic Incest offender comprises those individuals who have an erotic attraction to children. This category includes men who have sexually victimized both their own children and children unknown to them, as well as men who have resisted their fantasies of molesting children outside the home but eventually are overwhelmed by the ready availability of their own children or their children's friends and give in to their urges. The Child Rape offenders are fathers, typically surrogate fathers, inadequate men who nourish power, need to punish, and are attracted to violence. Their generalized tendency to antisocial behavior occasionally includes the sexual assault of their own children. The Perverse or Pornographic Incest offender's behavior is described by Summit and Kryso as “kinky, unfettered lechery.” They state further that, “These cases become more bizarre, more frankly erotic, more flagrantly manipulative and destructive than those in earlier categories.” There is a ritualistic, “pornographic” quality to these offenses that clearly reflects the driving force of a highly intrusive sexual fantasy life.
Although we know nothing about the predictive validity of Summit and Kryso's subtypes, we do know a great deal about the risk posed by child molesters who have a high degree of sexual preoccupation with children (conveyed by the label “pedophile”).
Proclivity Endured Many Years
I described these various types of incest offenders not because they convey any empirical reality (that is an unanswered scientific question), but because they clearly illustrate the heterogeneity of these offenders and the consequent variability of risk posed by these offenders. In the case under consideration, the defendant, Carl Peters, sexually assaulted his adopted daughter around 1976 and then he sexually assaulted his ten-year-old granddaughter (the child of his adopted daughter) in 1996, roughly twenty years later. Although it was unclear what the nature and quality of Mr. Peters relationships were like over the ensuing two decades, it is evident that his erotic attraction to young girls and his proclivity to act out his sexual urges involving young girls remained intact over a long stretch of time. Based on very limited information, it would seem reasonable to hazard a guess that Mr. Peters would more properly be classified, in Summit and Kryso's terms, as a Pedophilic Incest offender than as a True Endogamous Incest offender. Although we know nothing about the predictive validity of Summit and Kryso's subtypes, we do know a great deal about the risk posed by child molesters who have a high degree of sexual preoccupation with children (conveyed by the label “pedophile”). Hence, misclassification may lead to erroneous conclusions about risk.
Footnotes:
Summit, R. & Kryso, M.,
Sexual Abuse of Children: A Clinical Spectrum, 45 AM. J. ORTHOPSYCHIATRY 237-51.
