On giving offence: sexuality and psychosis in a forensic setting

In this symposium we aim to explore the relationship between sexuality, schizophrenia and crime. All the clinical work discussed took place within a forensic psychiatric setting. Using a cognitivebehavioural model, Dr Jon Mason and Dr Samantha Dove will present a group conducted for individuals with schizophrenia who had committed serious sexual offences. They will focus on the adaptations of the model needed to understand and treat sexual offenders with psychosis. Dr Gerard Drennan will discuss the individual psychotherapeutic treatment of a man who presented a complex interplay between paedophilic fantasy and paranoid psychotic symptoms, which raises questions about theoretical understandings of the relationship between psychosis and sexual perversion. Continuing the individual approach, Jane Basher will present a man who committed a serious violent offence during a psychotic episode; individual psychotherapy revealed underlying conflicts regarding both sexual and gender identity. Looking at a long-stay ward for offenders with mental illness, Dr Jay Smith and Dr Jamie Sullivan will reflect on ward and institutional dynamics related to sexual expression within a secure psychiatric setting