Mind Switch

by Lorne L. Bentley

  Maureen listened silently as Fred described the events of the week. At times he ruminated over the conflicts between his chief and the District Attorney as well as the sensitive political position he had recently been placed in. For the second time since his promotion, he wondered if he was really suited for this job.

  His story was interrupted by their three pound Yorkie, Molly, who jumped on his lap carrying her favorite tiny toy. Her message seemed to be, “Can’t you understand that nothing in life is more important than playing fetch and retrieve with a Yorkie?” Her unexpected arrival brought an all consuming laughter, something he had not experienced for days. The next few minutes were fully occupied with Fred and Maureen throwing a stuffed cotton bunny across the room, and having Molly continuously retrieve it.

  His play time with his toy terrier and the verbal catharsis he gained in his discussions with Maureen had reenergized him. He decided to provide Maureen with additional details of the case. She had a doctorate in psychology and a great appreciation and understanding of the nuances of human behavior. New theories in her field emerged everyday; paradigms altering old standard theories were becoming the fodder for best sellers. Fred realized that evolving theories were based on more massive amounts of factual data than ever had been witnessed in the past. CAT scans could now isolate which brain areas were activated by all types of emotional and stimuli. A limited number of savants had the ability to articulate how their unbelievable mathematical and memory skills were formed and executed. New frontiers were being breeched continuously, revealing numerous hidden secrets behind human behavior. Fred realized he had a great asset, who might be able to provide answers to the mystery behind Slivers’ actions.

  Maureen had everything—brains, beauty, and an unending enthusiasm for life’s new experiences and adventures. Together they had walked on Alaskan glaciers, hiked Pike’s Peak, and fallen asleep on the snow white sands of Siesta Key after watching the sun fading over the Gulf of Mexico. Most important to Fred was the fact that they loved each other unconditionally. He often thought back during their dating period four years ago when he first met her through an on-line dating service. They both had to fill out an extensive questionnaire, which if completed honestly, was intended to find matches with potential partners who possessed compatible personalities and interests. Initially they both wanted to meet informally. Then, if either felt the other was not a good connection, they could depart gracefully and move on to the next computer match. Maureen had selected Barney’s coffee shop based on its informal, open atmosphere, although at the time she didn’t know Fred was not and never had been a coffee drinker. Fred’s initial thought was to object to her choice; but he figured a conflict arising prior to their meeting was not pragmatic, so he deferred to her selection. Maureen was tall, almost 5’9”; and that day of their first meeting she wore two inch heels which made her tower over Fred as they met face to face—or in this instance face to neck.

  Fred was conscious of his height or lack of it; and when she first walked through the door he immediately had conflicting thoughts. His first thought was what a beautiful woman, with glistening brilliant red hair, a slim petite body and without, he was intuitively sure, the normal associated egoism. Contrastingly, he thought, my God she is tall! He had always avoided dating taller women. He suspected it was genetic conditioning passed through the ages, first brought about by the cave man’s desire to be physically superior to his mate based on his need to protect his women.

  He was wearing a red tie and she a pink rose clipped to her blouse, the identifications they had selected for their first meeting. From that day forward the die was cast. Each anniversary they would wear that which they wore on their first meeting. She procured a fresh rose every anniversary of their first date; he wore the same tie that he wore during their first meeting—a tie, which by now, was spotted with an assortment of food stains from their three years of annual celebrations. For purely nostalgic reasons he strongly resisted any attempt by Maureen to get it cleaned. Maureen was flattered by his romantic side, but only a bit more than she was turned off by his unsettling tie selection.

  They got along immediately, although the computer had apparently hit a few glitches in matching them up. She was a liberal, while he tended to be more conservative. She was firmly against the death penalty, he for it without qualification. She loved to sleep late; he was an early riser and had been his whole life. Somehow their opposite takes on life eventually proved unimportant. They both loved to walk on the beach, both appreciated animals, the smaller the better, and they shared a disdain for bigots of all types. They were both highly analytical in their own fields and enjoyed playing off ideas with each other. Soon the differences in height became insignificant, although she never wore heels again. And somehow he was able to find the latest men’s shoe styles that provided him with a very slight lift.

  They got married three months after their first meeting. Each year they celebrated their union at Barney’s and for the entire first year since their meeting to the present day, Fred never acknowledged that he hated coffee. To Fred that was a small price to pay for unending matrimonial bliss.

  At times, however, he did not understand her moods. She would take long solitary walks, sometimes in the middle of the night. During those periods she asked him not to join her. Fred realized that this was most likely her method of coping. She had been brought up by an abusive father and an alcoholic mother, a burden that continued to haunt her memories in adult life. Still there were times when his comments to her were frequently met with total silence, sometimes lasting for hours. He wished during those periods he could understand what she was going through. It seemed to him that during those prolonged periods a dark side of her personality had opened. However, when she emerged from these silences, she was her old self again except that she would never reveal to him what she had just experienced. She had an I.Q. in the stratosphere. With that much intelligence, Fred thought, maybe she somehow perceived and processed things and events much differently than he.

  Maureen listened carefully to Fred’s description of the case. He spent all of his time reflecting on the bank case since data was extremely limited in the theater murders. Beyond that, without a suspect in the latter case, it would be impossible for Maureen to apply her refined, psychological insights.

  After he had finished describing how Slivers acted in the video he had viewed, he wished he had brought a copy home so she could view it to share his impressions. Maureen asked how Slivers’ peers and employees described him. He said, “Everyone we’ve talked to said he was cheerful and very unassuming. He loved people and he was very detailed and dedicated.”

  “When he entered the bank,” she asked, “would you say he reflected the same personality attributed to him by his peers?”

  Fred said, “Yes, I think so. In fact he warmly greeted some customer who was just leaving the bank.”

  “But you said he seemed to have an attitude change just before he started firing his gun”?

  “Yes,” Fred replied.

  “And after he stopped his shooting spree, he started crying?” Maureen asked.

  “Yes!”

  Maureen took several seconds to think about Fred’s interpretation of events. She then said, “Without meeting this man, I would say he was not Howard Slivers at the time he started shooting people.”

  She paused and added, “However, the moment he stopped shooting he became Howard Slivers again.”

  Fred was totally confused. “I don’t understand what you are saying.”

  “It’s very simple,” she said. “My theory is that he has what the layman would call a multiple personality. We call it dissociative identity disorder. It’s characterized by two or more identities or personalities resident in the same individual that alternatively take over the person’s behavior. Often amnesia is associated with this condition. However, such amnesia is not necessarily uniform in all of the personalities; what is not known by one personality may be known by another.
In fact, in my judgment, Howard Slivers, the responsible family man, is not a murderer. But whoever was shooting that weapon for that moment in time was!

  “Of course,” she added, “he really was still Slivers; but the part of him that was his dark side dominated while he was in his killing mood. Perhaps that part of his personality had been buried for who knows how long.

  “New theories are now emerging about the relationship of genes to behavior. For example, INSIG2 is a gene variant which is associated with an increased risk of becoming fat—”

  “And I always thought it was caused by eating too much food,” Fred interrupted caustically.

  Maureen ignored him and went on, “And the lack of nueroD2 causes a reduced sense of fear, maybe some of our military heroes lack that gene. RD4 is related to sexual desire. AVPR1 variants link to creative dance capability and Y2A6 relates—”

  Fred thought, gee, they say men are from Mars and women from Venus?! Hell, they have to be from another parallel universe and another solar system within it. He knew what she was talking about would set them off into another endless argument in which she would take the position that people are not responsible for their behavior. In the past she argued it was because of the environment in which they were reared; now she was adding the fact that our genes predispose us to certain actions and behavior.

  He interrupted her, “Then you believe we have no self will, no control whatsoever about our actions? Hell, with that theory we might as well be robots responding to our environment based on how we were originally programmed at birth.”

  Redness appeared in her cheeks. “I didn’t say that, you are extrapolating much too much from what I just said.”

  Fred didn’t want to fight. He just wanted to have someone help him determine why all those people were murdered in the bank and theater. “Ok, I understand, but let’s return to your point about a dual personality.”

  Jim had a hard time taking in all that Maureen had to say, but he ventured another question. “Would you say that the periodic halting of his firing was a function of his shifting back and forth between Mr. Jekyll and Dr. Hyde?” he asked.

  Maureen had cooled down and responded to his question without emotion. She said, “I never heard of a case in which the transitioning of personality would occur so quickly. I have to believe it was for some other reason.”

  This had now become an enigma buried beneath a complex puzzle; and the more Fred thought about what he believed he knew, the more confused he became. He recalled a movie had once watched many years ago, “The Three Faces of Eve.” If he recalled correctly, it was based on a real life case of a woman with more than two personalities. At this stage, the multiple personality angle seemed to be more logical than the other possibilities he had considered.

  As if reading his thoughts she said, “What I am talking about is process schizophrenia. It’s a form of multiple personality, and yes, for your information, we believe genetic predisposition could be the cause. Beyond that, his amygdale and/or prefrontal cortex might factor in.”

  “What the hell are they?” he asked, almost wishing he had not.

  “The amygdale is the part of the brain where strong emotions and fear originate. It is the basis for human aggression. If that portion of the brain is over-reactive, violent behavior may result. But to the best of my knowledge there has been no specific research on neuro-anatomical localization of mass shooting behavior. Freud embraced the belief that it may have been tied to sexual dysfunction and rage, although that theory is certainly subject to question.”

  Maureen continued, “And the prefrontal cortex is the segment of the brain which maintains self-control. Its major function is to restrain the amygdale’s aggressive impulses. We are now learning the size of that part of the brain may have a significant influence on behavior. The woman’s prefrontal cortex is larger than man’s; and that is a good reason that less than ten percent of all prison inmates are women.”

  “Or because they never got caught!” he added emphatically.

  “You mean they never got caught because women are smarter then men, perhaps that’s another reason,” she added with the hint of a smile on her face.

  Fred gave up on any further discussion. He looked at her and suddenly all his anger melted. Damn, I love her, he thought. He went over to her chair and gave her a long, loving kiss.

  All was forgiven—even if he didn’t know what in hell she was talking about.

  Chapter 21

  Maureen was the psychologist in the family but Fred had extensively studied the personality profile of mass murders. He recognized that the major difference between a mass murderer and a serial killer was only a temporal one. Under that theory, the difference in the two lay solely in the time factor in which the killings are accomplished. Serial killers move from prey to prey, while mass murders accomplish the grisly task all at once. Often mass murderers have a deep hatred against society; almost half have had reported psychological problems prior to their rampage.

  Fred was intimately familiar with the types of serial killers including the visionary type who often are psychotic. They hear voices in their heads telling them to commit the crimes. The missionary or religious type need to rid the world of those whom they consider unacceptable. The thrill oriented and the lust killers get their arousal from the suffering of their victims.

  But mass murderers, on the other hand, are more often angry or humiliated people who develop a resentment of society over an extended time frame. During that period their resentment gradually grows, consummating due to an event that others might consider anticlimactic; but from their mental framework such an event magnifies the perception of life long failures. Most importantly, Fred recognized that mass murderers operate differently from classical murderers, who traditionally commit murder in reaction to an event or kill entirely for personal gain, either monetary or revenge.

  Few of the standard mass murder profiles seemed to fit the murder at the bank, except for the fact that often a mass murderer kills people whom they have no personal relationship with. Mass murder victims are usually selected at random. And, in Fred’s mind, until he could discern differently, that certainly seemed to fit the bank case as well as theater killings. Fred also knew that characteristically, mass murderers do not experience a cooling off period. They simply move on from one killing to another. Fred was worried that might well be the trend followed by the theater killer since he was not close to being captured and most likely was secure in that fact. More troubling to Fred was the fact that mass murderers appear normal on the outside and are not easily detectable.

  Chapter 22

  Ford was extremely pleased with himself. Everything was working for him just as he had envisioned. Soon he could give up his hypnotism practice which he had grown to hate more and more each day.

  In high school he had been considered an average student. Ford knew he could achieve much more, but it suited him perfectly to be perceived by his school officials as average. That way he would never be considered the architect of any crimes. In one such instance he had stolen thousands of dollars of equipment from the high school shop and subsequently sold them at a nice profit on E-bay. He had left subtle clues that pointed to another student who was innocent, but did not have a clue what was happening to him. The student, James Sullivan, was told if he provided the police with information as to where the missing equipment was, he could remain in school. When James indicated he had no idea what they were talking about, he was considered non-cooperative and tossed out of school.

  Actually, Ford had hidden the equipment in an unused school maintenance shop. None of the school authorities ever imagined that the stolen property might have remained on school grounds. When one of his stolen items sold on E-bay, he simply retrieved it from the maintenance shop and mailed it out from a post office a couple of towns away.

  In a couple of instances, he purposely created a disturbance to be sent to the principal’s office for disciplinary action. He knew the principal�
��s desk contained keys to all parts of the school. While the principal was occupied, he took the keys he wanted, had them duplicated and used one of the keys to re-enter the office after hours to return the original keys. With the duplicates he could selectively take whatever school property he desired. By the end of his senior year he had amassed over $30,000 in illegal profits. He was never suspected of any misdoing by either the school or his parents.

  In his senior year, on a dare, he took the SAT exam. He scored in the top five percent of graduating seniors. His teachers and the school administration accused him of cheating and refused to enter his scores. The strange element in the story was that Ford took the exam honestly, perhaps it was the first thing he had done honestly on his whole life. For almost four years, all through high school he had assumed a low profile so as not to draw attention to himself. In truth he could have been a brilliant student but he preferred to take a different and more lucrative path down life’s road. When he was accused of cheating, he admitted it, even though he had never seen the answers to the test nor had been aided in any way. Ford wanted to make sure he always remained under the radar; and acing a college entrance exam was not the way to do it!

  He had a friend in high school who practiced hypnotism as a hobby. Ford learned the technique from him and embellished it by reading books from the library and watching professional hypnotists at work. Once, at a bar, he tried hypnotism on a drunken patron as an experiment. He was surprised at how effective he was. He had the drunk buy all his drinks and refer to Ford as master. When he was finished he gave the drunk a post-hypnotic suggestion that the drunk would not know who Ford was. It worked perfectly; in fact Ford had to laugh when the drunk looked at his wallet and realized all his money was gone. At that point Ford realized that he had a lucrative future career in hypnotism.