Sexual Attraction to Corpses: A Psychiatric Review of Necrophilia Jonathan P. Rosman, MD; and Phillip J. Resnick, MD The authors review 122 cases (88 from the world literature and 34 unpublished cases) manifesting necrophilic acts or fantasies. They distinguish genuine necro- philia from pseudonecrophilia and classify true necrophilia into three types: ne- crophilic homicide, "regular" necrophilia, and necrophilic fantasy. Neither psychosis, mental retardation, nor sadism appears to be inherent in necrophilia. The most common motive for necrophilia is possession of an unresisting and unrejecting partner. Necrophiles often choose occupations that put them in contact with corpses. Some necrophiles who had occupational access to corpses committed homicide nevertheless. Psychodynamic themes, defense mechanisms, and treatment for this rare disorder are discussed. "Shall I believe about King Waldemar and Charle- That unsubstantial death is amorous, mag~e.'.~Necrophilia was considered by And that the lean abhorred monster keeps Thee here in dark to be his paramour?" the Catholic Church to be neither whor- -William Shakespeare' ing ("fornicatio") nor bestiality, but "pollution with a tendency to ~horing."~ Necrophilia, a sexual attraction to corpses, In more recent times, necrophilia has is a rare disorder that has been known been associated with cannibalism and since ancient times. According to Hero- myths of vampirism. The vampire, who dotus,' the ancient Egyptians took pre- has been romanticized by the Dracula cautions against necrophilia by prohib- tales, obtains a feeling of power from his iting the corpses of the wives of men of victims, "like I had taken something rank from being delivered immediately powerful from them."' Cannibalistic to the embalmers, for fear that the em- tribal rituals are based on the notion that balmers would violate them. According consumption of human flesh imparts a to a legend, King Herod had sex with special power or strength to the canni- his wife Marianne for seven years after bal. Browne even described a "healthy he killed her.3.4 Similar legends exist necrophilism," found in the "memen- Drs. Rosman and Resnick are from the School of toes cherished in every household of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland. Ohio. Address reprint requests to Dr. J. P. Rosman. those who passed away."x Department of Psychiatry. Cleveland Metropolitan The theme of necrophilia has been General Hospital, 3395 Scranton Rd., Cleveland, Ohio 44109. captured by some famous artists. The The authors thank Dr. B. R. Burg, Dr. S. Hucker, M. classical "Sleeping Beauty" tales embody Marler, and the Behavioral Sciences Unit of the FBI for their assistance. a necrophilic fantasy, in which a corpse Bull Am Acad Psychiatry Law, Vol. 17, No. 2, 1989 153 Rosman and Resnick is restored to life. Shakespeare's "Romeo case assessment, statistical analyses of and Juliet" conveys a similar fantasy. the data were not performed. The data Some "Heavy Metal" songs explicitly were aggregated from several decades, deal with necrophilia. many countries, and various languages. Several authors have used single case There were great variations in the re- reports as the basis for psychiatric hy- porting methods. Further, the problems potheses to explain necrophilia. How- of a low base rate and gaps in the data ever, it is hard to draw any conclusions enhance the risk of ~verinterpretation.~' about the true nature of necrophilia Classification from individual cases, even if they are We classified the sample into two detailed studies. Our goal was to gain a broad groups: (1) Genuine necrophilia more thorough understanding of necro- philia by examining the largest possible (N = 54); (2) Pseudo-necrophilia (N = 33). There were insufficient data to clas- sample. To this end, we collected 88 sify 35 cases. cases from the world literat~re~-~,'-~~and The genuine necrophile has a persist- 34 unpublished case reports from col- ent sexual attraction to corpses. The sex- leagues. ual attraction may be manifested in the Methods necrophile's fantasies, or in a series of Each case was analyzed according to necrophilic acts. Most of this group fits a number of variables. There is an ob- the DSM-111-R diagnosis of Paraphilia vious bias in the material towards re- Not Otherwise Spe~ified.~'It includes cording positive, rather than negative, cases in which the corpse represents a data. For example, if mutilation was fetishistic object. mentioned in a case description, there is We classified the genuine necrophiles no doubt that it occurred; authors are, into three groups, based on the nature however, less inclined to report a nega- of their acts with corpses: tive finding such as mutilation. A. Necrophilic homicide-murder to On the other hand, information was obtain a corpse for sexual purposes (N quite clear regarding homicide. Authors = 14); are unlikely to fail to record a homicide B. Regular necrophilia-the use of al- associated with necrophilia. Similarly, ready dead bodies for sexual pleasure (N the "pure" fantasizers are easily distin- = 21); guished from those necrophiles who car- C. Necrophilic fantasy-fantasizing ried out their acts, since authors invari- about sexual activity with a corpse, with- ably document the occurrence of sexual out carrying out any necrophilic acts (N activities with a corpse. = 15). The percentages given have been cal- (Four cases of genuine necrophilia had culated according to the number (N) of insufficient data to be subclassified into cases for which positive or explicitly neg- these groups.) 1 ative data were available for that item. The pseudonecrophile has a transient Due to the limitations of retrospective attraction to a corpse, but corpses are 154 Bull Am Acad Psychiatry Law, Vol. 17, No. 2, 1989 Sexual Attraction to Corpses not the object of his sexual fantasies. He self as having "died in spirit" a year prefers sexual contact with living part- earlier. The corpses gave her comfort, as ners. This group includes sadistic, op- well as the sense of being able to touch portunistic, and transitory cases. and express herself to someone (Brom- berg, personal communication). Case lllustrations C. Necrophilic Fantasy A 40-year- The following case vignettes illustrate old, single white man requested psychi- these four categories. atric help because he was afraid that he would carry out a repetitive fantasy he 1. Genuine Necrophilia had had since he was 15. His fantasy was A. Necrophilic Homicide A 25- to kill a woman, cut her up, remove the year-old, single white male college senior organs, and then masturbate while im- engaged in conventional sexual relations mersing his hands in the blood of the with his live-in girlfriend. He had a high corpse. sex drive and masturbated approxi- He had always been socially isolated. mately seven times a day. He had a large He had been caught masturbating in collection of pornography and had com- public places and engaging in voyeuristic mitted acts of bestiality, urophilia, and activities. Choking prostitutes also ex- coprophilia. He had engaged in necro- cited him sexually. In his late 20s, he philic acts with animals he had killed obtained a job in a morgue for the sole and with bodies in the morgue of the purpose of being near dead bodies. Al- hospital where he worked as an orderly. though he denied any actual sexual con- He had a longstanding fantasy of having tact with the corpses, he had become "all kinds of sex" with a dead body. He sexually excited by cutting them up. He thought his destiny was to be someone killed animals for the purpose of carry- special, either the Antichrist or the ing out a similar fantasy. He killed the prophet Elijah. He murdered an eight- animals painlessly, taking no pleasure in year-old neighborhood girl in order to the killing itself. His pleasure came from carry out his sexual fantasy (Rosman the mutilation ofthe warm bodies (Risen, and Resnick). personal communication). B. Regular Necrophilia A 2 l-year- old, separated white woman was em- 2. Pseudonecrophilia ployed as an apprentice embalmer for A 37-year-old, single white man went four months. During that time, she had out drinking with his 49-year-old girl- sexual intercourse with 20-40 male friend. He had been a heavy drinker corpses. She engaged in necrophilia be- since his teen years. On the way home, cause she could not achieve sexual sat- he shot her through the head "by acci- isfaction with a living person. She had dent." He said he had felt threatened by been sexually molested at the age of a passerby who stopped to bother him. eight, and raped by a teacher when she While he was engaged in hiding the was fourteen. She drank heavily and had body, he became sexually excited. He very low self-esteem. She regarded her- had anal intercourse with the corpse, Bull Am Acad Psychiatry Law, Vol. 17, No. 2, 1989 155 Rosman and Resnick and then disposed of it. He had read telligence were taken only from those about necrophilia in pornography mag- cases in which specific intelligence quo- azines (Bertschinger, personal commu- tients were reported. All (N = 13) had nication). IQs above 80, and 69 percent (N = 13) had IQs above 100. Of the true necro- Characteristics of the Sample philes, 86 percent (N = 7) had IQs above In the pseudonecrophile group, relia- 100. ble information was available only for Sexual Orientation The sexual ori- the subgroup that committed homicide. entation of our sample (N = 71) was Our cases yielded the following demo- comparable to that of the general popu- graphic information: lation: 79 percent (56) were heterosex- Age The ages of the necrophiles were ual; 13 percent (9) were bisexual; 9 per- noted at the time that they committed cent (6) were homosexual. Among the their necrophilic acts; in the case of the true necrophiles (N = 40), 70 percent fantasizers, ages were noted at the time (28) were heterosexual, 15 percent (6) that their fantasies were revealed.