ABSTRACT
People who take part in organized violent crime and who aim at gain from crime do not fall under the category of latent murderers: somewhere in these people's minds, though possibly not in the foreground of their conscious thought, is the possibility of killing and its counterpart, that of being killed. The persons I wish to consider fall into two main groups: first, those who are unaware that they harbor murder inside and discover it catastrophically in the course of a conflict; and second, individuals who know that they have something murderously destructive within themselves but devote conscious and determined efforts to keep it under control. In a particularly difficult situation or state of mind—mourning for a lost loved one or in a state of delirium, for example—the murderousness may burst out of its restrictions and controls and the deed done. Such people tend to reinstate their controlled selves and give themselves up to the authorities.
