"I Profile Psychopaths"- These 20 Red Flags Will Make You Question the Man Lying Next to You…

The art of manipulation is someone making you do things, and you don't even realize you're doing it. When someone's being gaslit by an expert manipulator, they don't know which way is up. They will love bomb you. They will have a strategic campaign to win your heart. They seek to utterly dominate. If you see it, run.

So, Laura, as a criminal analyst who's trained under New Scotland Yard and the FBI, you actually use a checklist that screens for psychopathy. And if they score over 30, then that proves that, yes, they are a psychopath. So what is on that checklist, and what are the telltale signs that we need to watch out for?

Yeah, I mean, there are two checklists. There's one that's called the DASH, which I created in the UK, and that's the Domestic Abuse, Stalking, and Harassment, and Honor-Based Violence Risk Checklist. And that's what is used when there is a report of domestic violence or coercive control or stalking or honor-based violence to police. But actually, anyone can use that checklist. It can be used by victims themselves. So that's once you're in a relationship, and that's what I use with victims all the time, present day.

The other is called the Psychopathy Checklist, and that was developed by someone called Dr. Robert Hare. And when I started working cases of serial rape, murder, and abduction in England and Wales, and I ran the Homicide Prevention Unit, that psychopathy checklist was important for indirect assessments and understanding because we know that, you know, those serial killers, what we would now call coercive control, there are traits, there are things that we can see, but we have to be looking for them.

So, you know, my top, number one thing that's actually not on that checklist, ironically, is power and control, and coercive control. And the key thing that motivates them is power and control. They seek to utterly dominate. And actually, their whole psychopathology is dominate or be dominated. And that's how they understand the world. That's how they move through the world. And they see people really as just objects to be dominated and to be used for their own gain. So their needs are the most important thing to be met.

So that's what you're looking for early on in a relationship. And that Jackal and Hyde, you know, if you see it, run. Because they will come up with all sorts of reasons for why they did what they did. And often they break down into victim mode when challenged about it. And they will say things like, "Well, it's because I was abused as a child," or "This happened to me." And the woman will listen, and she'll then start feeling sorry for him, and she'll go straight into empathy mode. And she'll now be comforting him rather than standing her ground about the thing that he did that upset her.

And, you know, what? When I interview those women, they don't even know how they got there or how he flipped that script. But before they know it, they're now on the wrong foot. They're now comforting him, and the other thing has gone away. And they don't even know that that's what's going on. So the early identification and intervention and prevention starts straight away. And look, I never want to wait for things to escalate where the police are involved.

But when I psychologically autopsy cases, I always say, "Tell me about how you met." And they then start to describe. They might say, "Oh, it was 10 years ago." And I said, "Well, tell me about that." And what I often find is that they've been targeted. So the setup is very important. They are trying to figure out who's compliant, who's going to be malleable. And of course, women, girls were taught to be compliant, and we're taught to be polite, we're taught to be malleable. But there are certain women who are even more empathetic and malleable.

So I'll give you an example. Everyone's heard about the case of Dirty John and Deborah Newell. And John Meehan was a psychopath. He's somebody who I indirectly assessed. I spent a lot of time analyzing his life and how he targeted women. He met Deborah Newell, and they met on a dating site. And she felt he was too good to be true. He took many boxes for Deborah. And he ended up being a very coercively controlling and dangerous man. But he didn't present as that to begin with. And they ended up getting married very quickly, no real checks and balances in place. He kept pushing the relationship, and they did marry within months. Her daughters were against it. They didn't feel John was who he was claiming he was. He was making out he was a, you know, he was a doctor. And one of the daughters didn't buy it because he had dirty fingernails and his scrubs were always dirty. And she had worked in a medical setting and knew that that was a big no-no.

So when she realized that there were red flags and that was dangerous, and the daughters had hired a private investigator, she was already in too deep. But she disappeared herself for six months. And she lived out of a hotel. She wore wigs. She had different cars. But what she didn't bank on was that he would target her daughters. And that's what he did. And because he couldn't get to Deborah, he was going to seek revenge on her by going after the people she cared about the most.

Now, ironically, it didn't end the way that John thought it would. He had a knife. He intended to kidnap, terror. And she unbelievably fought him and won. And she ended up putting the knife through his eye and killing him.

So when I first spoke to Deborah and said, "You called it coercive control, Laura," you said, and you described to a team, "My life, me, what was going on in terms of what he did to me." But also him, and you gave me my dignity back because people kept blaming me. "Why didn't I do this? Why didn't I do that? Why, why didn't I protect the children?" She said, "I'd love to meet with you and just understand how you knew all the things that you did."

So I did meet with her. And I asked her, "Tell me about that first date." And she said, "Oh, you know, I met him on this dating app. He was too good to be true. I mean, we go on this date, he's the perfect gentleman. We're talking." And I said, "How much talking did you do?" And she said, "I talked a lot." And she sort of laughed. She said, "He was a really good listener, Laura." And that's one of the things that I really valued about him. And I said, "Oh, why?" And, uh, I knew what was coming. And she said, "Because in my previous relationships, and I was married before, the men didn't listen to me." I said, "Did you tell him that?" She said, "Yes." I said, "Did you tell him about all your previous relationships?" She said, "Yes." And I said, "And did you tell him what you were looking for in a man?" She said, "Yes."

And then I knew she'd given him the blueprint for everything she was looking for. He just became an embodiment. He literally ticked every box for her because she had handed over the blueprint to him. And that's a very important lesson to girls and women. When you go on dates, don't overshare. You don't want to talk about everything that went wrong in previous relationships and give them all this information that could potentially be weaponized. So that's always the first golden rule of preparing to go on a date. And be clear what your goal is. And it shouldn't be to overshare and give a blueprint to somebody about everything that you're looking for in a future partner.

So unfortunately, they have no moral code at all, which means they have many more options available to them. And that's what they're looking for: dominate or be dominated. And if you're going to expose someone like that, you better, you better know what you're doing because they will come back at you and they will scorch the earth. They won't just give you a ding, they will look to destroy you.

And so once that changes, that dynamic, and they see that you see them or you understand, they get into that scorch the earth mode. And that's when it's very dangerous. Actually, it's not just about being wronged, it could be your life is in danger. So that's why the work that I do, and with the DASH in particular, it's a life-saving checklist. And it gives the victim permission to tell us what's going on because often they feel shame and blame and judgment and all the things that keep her entrapped. And the perpetrator knows those things. So he will use all of her biggest fears as leverage to keep her quiet and keep her controlled.

You know, psychopaths will stop at nothing. Nothing and no one is off limits to them. And people will think, "Oh, well, it's their child," or "It's their, their wife." No, if you're going to expose them, or if you're, um, looking to, um, exact your will or your autonomy, and they've been in control up until that point, that's when you can see a very different side to them.

I'd love to actually go through some of them, if you don't mind, because you live a very different life, I think, than a lot of us women. And so I bet your Spidey senses are like, just hella strong now. But like, for most of us, I'm just naive. And I hate to say that out loud, but I think I am. When I start going into your world and reading up on the things that you deal with, and what the depths of, um, the level that a psychopath or a sociopath or a narcissist will go to, you've seen the results of that. But really, starting from your everyday woman that doesn't notice the small thing.

So let's go through a couple of the points that Dr. Hare developed on the checklist. So we've got superficial charm. How do you even spot superficial charm?

Yeah, it's a hard one, right? And, and Spidey senses, just to pick up on something you said, is so important, right? What our gut tells us. We have more brain cells in our gut, in our stomach, than a dog has in its head. But we do. And that gut instinct is so important. We feel it here first of all, when something's off. Then the brain starts to rationalize what it is. And then if you've got someone reinforcing and chiming with that rationalization, we kick it off. And what I say to all women is, never ignore your gut instinct. If you do, that's when you'll find a problem.

And so always being in that moment of, if the hairs on your arms went up or the back of your neck, that's the early predator alert system. We all have it. And it's part of Darwinian survival, right? There are some things that we don't see or we can't put our finger on, but we intuit it. We feel it. It's in the ether. It's part of someone's aura. It's how they come across. It might be a microexpression. It's something we pick up. We can't always rationalize it. But always, always believe what your gut's saying. You know, be curious, ask questions, and always trust your instincts.

When I was at New Scotland Yard, I read thousands of rape statements. And you know what? In pretty much every case, the woman sensed danger before the rape happened. And she allowed her rationalization, you know, to minimize, to rationalize, to, "I don't want to be rude," so, you know, "I don't want to make him feel uncomfortable." So I'm not going to do X or Y. And that was the moment when, and I'm not blaming her, by the way, but that's the moment when she could have acted. And you never get that moment back again. But interviewed so many victims, and they will say, "If only I had." If they're aware of it, because they felt it and they intuited it first. And your gut, you know, when you're in danger, and just get out of that situation immediately.

All right, guys, we'll be right back with Laura. But for one second, if this episode or any other episode of Women of Impact has brought you value, please, please do smash that subscribe button down there because you have no idea how much that becomes the calling card to every single woman out there that this is the place to be because we women unite, we hold hands, we cheer each other on, and we have each other's backs. So smash that subscribe button, guys. Thanks for listening. Now back to the episode.

So many of us women have been taught, especially at my age, I'm 45, so growing up, I was of the generation where I got patted on the head and I was told, "Little girls don't speak unless spoken to. Don't overreact. Don't be emotional." Like, that's the messaging I got. So when you come to moments like this where your gut's trying to tell you something, and you've had, let's say, you're 15 years old, you've had 15 years of belief system that they're saying, "Don't speak up. Don't make a fuss. Uh, don't react." That training, to your point, overrides it.

And I've actually shared this story a few times on this show. But there was one time I was in Virginia. I was in the middle of nowhere in a gas station. I was putting gas in my car. I go to pay, and as I'm walking back to the car, a guy's like, "Excuse me, Miss. Miss, do you mind just helping me with my car?" Like, "Oh, what's the matter?" "Because if you can just get in the car and start the engine." Now, once upon a time, I would have ignored the hairs on the back of my neck. But because I had remembered, this is where you get trapped, Lisa. To your point, I just ran.

So I really hope that's what this interview and this discussion does today. Is that if you were the person that never trusted your gut instinct, if you were the person or the woman, like, again, not blaming you, but how can we teach and train ourselves into starting to listen to it?

Yeah, I mean, there could be. And by the way, the story you just told, you know, I took a breath as you were saying that because the minute he would have had you in that car, then you have lost all your power, right? Your personal power. A, because you're sat down and if they're above you. But B, also you're now isolated. And C, why would he want you to do that? Why isn't he the person in the car turning the ignition and you're looking at whatever it is he wants you to see? So your gut, everything about that screams red flag, run. And that's what I want people to do.

And look, every woman has a scary story. And if not multiple, I have many stories like that. And I'd rather just seem impolite and a bit rude rather than the other consequence, which is something that changes my life forever, or maybe I don't even get out of that situation, right? Some women don't. Yeah. As I'm running, I'm literally saying to myself, "Oh my God, you're so silly. This poor guy probably just needs help with his car." Like, as I'm running, that's what's going on in my mind. But I know I know better. Yeah. So I'd rather look silly, embarrassed, a little like, "Oh God, I can't believe she just did that," than unfortunately, the consequences.

And, you know, far too often, the woman lets them either carry the bag, or they stay on the tube train, or they don't, you know, cross the road, they don't run. Um, and there's serious repercussions as a consequence of that. Um, but going back to the question about superficial charm. I mean, the first thing is, is to be watching and on the lookout for it, right? To be present and actively looking at, is this a genuine depth of charm, or are they trying to manipulate? Is it about increasing likability? And as I always say, charm disarms.

So the first thing for me, because I am long in the tooth, I am cynical. You know, if someone compliments me, I'm a bugger because I'm immediately, "What do they want? What do they want? What are they seeking to achieve?" Look, and people aren't born charming, right? It's a skill set that we develop. We learn that if we charm, a little bit of honey goes a long way, as my mom used to say. And so we learn that to more or less of a degree in our everyday lives. But psychopaths have it finely honed. So it is quite difficult to detect what is genuine and what's superficial.

So what you're really looking for is, do they have a very shallow range of emotions? You know, it's these sorts of things. Is it a genuine depth of emotion, or does it feel like they're going through the motions? Um, because often that's how women might describe it to me. It's like they're ticking boxes, and there's no real emotional depth. Or one minute they can be in one emotion, like they're really happy about something, then I say something, or I do something, and it's like the switch goes, and they hit N to 60. But they come out of the N to 60 equally as quickly. So there's no real depth. Whereas most people, if you get worked up, you know, if I'm wound up, it takes a lot to get me there, but when I'm there, it takes quite a lot for me to calm down and regulate again. And I have to go for a walk or for a run or, you know, go through the motions. That means that the emotion was deep.

Psychopaths have no depth. They will just appear chameleon-esque. They will be mirroring back. So even when you're sitting with them, they will mirror back your body language. They will be mirroring everything that you're doing to increase, um, likability. Even through, you know, neurolinguistic programming, they use similar words. They will mirror and match and socially engineer things. So, "Oh, you go to that church? Oh, me too. Oh, you play tennis there? That's me too." You know, and you're thinking, "Oh, wow, this person's, they're saying we're meant to be." You see, and you end up saying, "Wow, we really are meant to be."

Unfortunately, once people are hooked in, you know, when people say, you know, "rose-tinted glasses," and when we fall in love, we tend to see those signs, but we negate them. We put them to the side. And why I say that is because I do think women see these things, but often we don't want to admit that we've seen it. And we would far rather concentrate on the benefit of the doubt. So that's the other risk marker for me. If they're too good to be true, do your checks and balances. I think too many people go along with that whirlwind romance. And the psychopath, the coercive controller, will put it into a whirlwind. They will love bomb you. They will, you know, have a strategic campaign to win your heart. They will say all the things, do all the things, the gifts, the friends, the family. Most of them will be encouraging this relationship because they're like, "God, he's a great guy. Like, he's helping you out with the kids, and he's helping you out with your dad, and he's doing all these things." You know, "This guy really is the real deal." So they will be forcing you to see this person in a positive light too. If they're very good at charming.

But as I always say, slow the relationship down. You know, you want to see this person in every situation. You want to see when they travel, when they're not in their comfort zone. Oh, interesting. When things don't work for them, who are they? That's who I'm interested in. Coming up. And if you do start to see these red flags, don't ignore them because it's not going to get better. It's only going to get worse.

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You know, you want to see this person in every situation. You want to see them when they travel, when they're not in their comfort zone. Oh, interesting. When things don't work for them, who are they? That's who I'm interested in.

Interesting. Okay, so being out of their norm because it almost has they have a little less control. So you can see how they respond to not having the control of the situation. Those are really clear signs. Someone just may be in a bad mood. So I assume that's why you say take it slowly because it's like, well, you can then see over a period of, let's say, a year, if they're consistently like that every time something goes wrong, or if it happened to be the time when they had a bad day at work.

Exactly. And that's what I mean. The long-term part is very important to see because it's the biggest investment you'll make. And you want to understand their stresses, their pressures, their belief system, which I know you're very interested in. You want to understand all of that. But I always recommend, you want the honeymoon to last as long as possible, right? Why would you want to accelerate things and hack the process? Where's the fire to do that? You want to see everything about them and how they operate, how they behave, and see them at their best. Are you? When you go on a date, that's at their best. But you also want to see them when things don't go the way that they want, when other people test their boundaries, when they're in a country where they don't speak the language, where the car breaks down and they don't know where they are or who to call, where they get lost, you know, on a journey, and how do they react to that?

So I always think traveling really reveals the person. It shows how people can adapt and how they cope. And it gives you, if you're traveling with them, the 24/7, you are able to see them like the Rubik's Cube and turn it around to know whether, yeah, someone just had a bad day, something just didn't work out. Look, those things happen to all of us. But is it something that actually you see they have, not to 60, this fire temper that comes out of nowhere? And some describe it as a white rage, and they get this ice cube effect, and you felt fear. You know, you want to see all of these things. And if you do start to see these red flags, don't ignore them because it's not going to get better. It's only going to get worse.

Let me take a deep breath, girl. Um, okay. I'd love to go over a few other ones, if that's okay with you. Um, so we've got grandiose sense of self-worth. So what does that look like on a day-to-day?

They often think they're the best at whatever it is that they're interested in or aspiring, uh, to do or be. And it doesn't match with the experience. It doesn't match with their life experience or who they are or what you see. So, you know, someone like Jeffrey Epstein wanted to come across as if he was an academic and a very smart guy. So he applies to some of the best places in New York, and he doesn't get in. But then he starts teaching, I think it was maths, at one of the best colleges there with no qualification whatsoever. But because of his confidence level, and he was a good talker, charismatic when he chose to be, because as a lot of people say, he didn't have those interpersonal skills, he did when he wanted something. And people didn't question it.

And so you see a lot with these guys, and predominantly it is men we're talking about, is they talk really good game, but their qualifications and experience does not match that game. But they are so confident that people just believe them. And that is a big difference between women and men, because women actually tend to, even if they have the skill set, they underestimate that level of skill set or what value they bring to the table. These guys really ramp it up. They are the best at at this thing, whatever it might be.

As I was changing the law on coercive control, there was a case of a woman called Vicki Sniegocki, who sadly plummeted from a plane. She had a parachute on. She was a parachute instructor. She had just had her second baby. And her husband encouraged her to do another jump. And her husband, for all intents and purposes, he looked like he ticked every box of being a pillar of the community, when you see him in military dress and so on. Well, he encourages her to take this jump, which she does. But the parachute doesn't open, nor does her reserve. It had been sabotaged. And she plummets 4,000 feet. And Lisa, whoever was looking out for her that day, it's incredible because she survived. What she survived, a 4,000-foot drop. How, how do you survive that? I mean, they all felt they were going to find her and need a body bag, right? But she was still alive. And they rushed her to hospital, and she survived.

And when the, uh, chief instructor at Netheravon Airfield examined the parachute, right? This is one in a billion, billion of two shoots not opening. One, you can understand. But your reserve? So he took the whole shoot apart and saw it had been sabotaged. Called the police. The police suspect the husband, Amir Sniegocki, who had encouraged her to do this jump. And they start to investigate him. But Victoria is having none of it. And what they find is when they look at his phones, he's been not just dating many other women, but seeing sex workers. His whole preoccupation is with sex, not work, but sex. And he's not just cheated, he's run up financial debt. Um, he's done so many terrible things. And they believe that he is responsible.

And they find out from one of her friends who was a doctor, who called them, who said, "Their relationship is really problematic. I'm really worried. She's my best friend. I shouldn't be telling you this, but I'm so married, I'm going to tell you what's going on in this relationship." Which she does. And she said, "If Amir Sniegocki was anywhere near that parachute before Victoria jumped, you have to look at him." And that's what they did. And they found out that he had taken the parachute into the toilet with their toddler and was in there for five minutes before her jump.

So when they speak to Victoria, she just couldn't believe it. But she said, "Well, I suppose I should probably tell you about the gas leak." And the officer said, "What gas leak?" So she then says, "A week ago, the gas valve under the sink had been opened. And I text Amir, I said, 'You know, did you, did you touch the gas valve under the sink?'" He said, "Well, did you turn, can you turn the stove on? Test it by turning the stove on." She didn't do that, thank goodness. But that was the second followup. And that's when they decide, when she tells them that she's going to, they're going to go and arrest him. And when they tell her they're going to arrest him, her world fell apart. She couldn't handle it. And she protested on his side. She defended him, such was the coercive control and the manipulation.

But Amir Sniegocki, whenever he met women, he was the best at everything. And if you start to look at their history, you see that actually their experience, their qualifications, it doesn't match to the talk. But there's that kernel of truth. I.E., he was in the British army, he was a sergeant. And there he is in his military dress with his shiny shoes. And you would never suspect that he was a psychopath. But it took a female detective whose instinct about him, for six hours, he talked at her with misogyny and the way he talked about women and about Victoria. He was going to leave her. He doubted baby number two was even his. He questioned the paternity. And this female detective is listening to him and is just thinking, "This guy, we've really got to look at him."

You know what's fascinating? I mean, thank you for sharing that. That's utterly heartbreaking. One thing you actually said is it took a woman police officer to trust her gut and recognize it. But what's sad is the wife didn't trust her gut. The fact that he turned on the gas and was like, "I'll just switch it on to see if it works." That wasn't enough of a sign for her.

Well, you see, I think it was. And Victoria, I've always been very interested in, because when it went to trial, she sabotaged the trial. She said that she was the one who sabotaged her own parachute. So the question is, why would someone, why would she do that? Right? When there were two attempts on her life. So I was always very interested, and I always am, in victimology. And what it really taught me with with Victoria is that the betrayal trauma was so great, she just could not accept that this man who she had this fairy tale wedding with, and she'd been married before, she wanted this happy ending. The betrayal trauma was so catastrophic, she couldn't deal with it. But she knew. She knew deep down, because otherwise, would she say to the police, "Oh, I suppose I should tell you about the gas valve"? She offered that up, right? So you look for the clues in amongst things where, when someone's being gaslit, uh, by an expert manipulator, they don't know which way is up. But their gut, they normally have a sense deep down. So when they say something like that, and then they're angry with the police for pursuing it, they're telling you really that yes, they've been gaslit, they've been manipulated, but they cannot deal with that betrayal trauma. And often with with victims, particularly of psychopaths and coercive controllers, they may well defend that person. And again, the reason being is because the love, the attachment, the emotional attachment and investment is so great. And they want the person to go back to who they were when they first met them. And they will say, "I just want him to go back to who he was when I first met him, Laura." And I'll say, "Well, tell me about that." And they say, "Those first six months, Laura, they were incredible." And then they start to describe the "too good to be true," the perfect. And they may have been with him. I had one lady who was with this guy for 10 years. And for the first six months, he was that. But for the rest of the time, he abused her in every way. And she really thought that that first six months, that was him versus the nine years of his behavior, because there were good times too, as well, peppered in that nine years, right? And the offender will leverage those things.

So going back to Victoria Sniegocki, she still, even saw him after the first trial failed. Because they did go to a second trial, she even went to go and see him. And he started doing the head work again, trying to manipulate, trying to get back in. And she was the one that really swayed the jury. Because she's also an incredible woman. I mean, she's very smart, very well put together, smart, eloquent. You know, we're not talking about women who are, uh, naive or silly. We're talking about women who've got their together, quite frankly. But they believe in the power of love. They believe in what they're being sold. And they don't believe someone could be so diabolical. Lisa. And unfortunately, with my work, I know they can be so diabolical. But they can mask it very well too.

Well, so is he, um, would you diagnose him as a psychopath?

Absolutely. Yeah. So this is Dr. Robert Hare's Psychopathy Checklist. So he has 20 traits listed. And I can do indirect assessments of someone if and only if I can talk to the people who know that individual very well. I.E., they've lived with them, uh, their sister, their mother, their wife, their partner, their best friends. These people that can hold the mirror up to who the perpetrator really is. So yes, when I did the indirect assessment of John Meehan, going back to Dirty John, because T, the first wife, and I had reinvestigated John Meehan. And I said to her when I first met her, "You don't really know who John is, you know, some of the things." And she said, "No, I've been to therapy, Laura. I, you know, I'm far along the line to Deborah." And I said, "What I understood of of John Meehan, he was so prolific, you will only know a tiny portion of his life, what he wants you to see." Because I could tell she was a lovely woman as well. She didn't dig and ask questions. And so when Dirty John hit the TV show, and she sees, you know, she's just a tiny portion of it. Well, she was with him for 10 years. And it made her go back to the conversation she and I had. And she said, "You know what? I need to ask those questions." Because she had two children with him. So we were all the way back into his childhood, you know, speaking to his sisters, speaking to his mother. Couldn't speak to his dad because his dad died in very suspicious circumstances when John was in the room. His brother died in very suspicious circumstances. But talking to some of his friends, people who hadn't been spoken to before. And with T, I could do an indirect assessment of John Meehan. And he scored 40 out of 40 on the psychopathy checklist.

What kind of questions are you asking the people that he knows then to find out if he has those traits or not?

First of all, I wouldn't sit with them and ask them the 20 traits. I would ask them to describe, okay, um, you know, their relationship with that person. And you can pick these things out. And you can say, "Well, tell me about that." And then you start to get an understanding. And then you match it across other people's, you know, telling. Okay, doesn't take responsibility, has no empathy. So you can start to build that picture. So although I have the 20 traits, and if I'm talking to a woman like T or Deborah, where they've had a relationship, I use the DASH as well. Because the DASH is really victim-focused. Psychopathy Checklist Revised by Dr. Robert Hare is ultimately perpetrator-focused. But what I do find, and, you know, I've had to, uh, get involved in multiple campaigns to keep very dangerous psychopaths in prison when their terms come up because they can charm the professionals into thinking that they have empathy, they have remorse, they tick these boxes, and they charm the professionals to. And people get sucked into their, their, their retelling of a story that doesn't check back to the to the true facts. But every lie serves a purpose.

So what I find with the indirect assessments of talking to many different people who knew that say, John Meehan, it tends to be much more reliable because you've got multiple sources cooperating. Those who rely just on the perpetrator, well, you better watch out because mostly they don't tell the truth. And yet professionals don't have that on their radar that if they are a psychopath, well, maybe they haven't even screened them for psychopathy. And pathological lying is one of the key traits.

Oh my God, the way you broke that down is so enlightening and scary and horrifying. Um, because I think about, well, if these professionals who, from my perspective, right, these, you know, parole officers, they're all professionals, if they can't spot it, how do us women on an average Wednesday, going on a random day, going to be able to spot that so that we don't become the next victim?

I mean, with T, when she got together with John, and they met in a bar, and I said, "Tell me how you met." Well, she actually just said, "We met in a bar." And I said, "Well, tell me about it." Because I really have to dig deep. And she said, "Well, I was with my friends, you know, we're all kicking off. We had a stressful day at the hospital. I go to the bathroom, and he was there. He was there with his mate, stood at the toilet." And she said, "And I went to go in. He said, 'Hey,' and he started, you know, chatting me up, bit of banter." I went into the toilet. When I came back, he was still there. And he continued. And he asked me what I did for a living. I said, "Well, what did you say?" She said, "Nurse." And I said, "Tick." She said, "Why did you say tick?" I said, "Because you're compassionate, you're empathetic, you're kind." Oh, and that's what he knows. The setup happens immediately, right? But then he said, "Can I buy you a drink?" I said, "But you told me it was ladies' night, wasn't it? Free drinks." She said, "Yeah." And so he didn't buy you a drink. No, but he seemed a nice guy. And his friend left, and he stayed. And I thought he just wanted to chat. But he asked me, "Could I take him home? Give him a lift?" I said, "No." I said, "Good for you." She said, "Yeah, but then I said yes." I said, "Oh." And she said, "Then I told him, I'm not coming in your house. And I'm going to sit outside in the car." He said, "Oh, come on." And so she said, "I went. I went in." Well, we were just messing around. We're playing basketball, you know, and it got a bit more tactile. So then he went in to kiss me. I said, "Oh." And then what happened? She said, "It's not my proudest moment, Laura. We did end up sleeping together. And I've never done this before." And I just felt shame, you know, afterwards. And I just notched it up to this one-night stand. And I said, "Well, what happened next?" And she said, "The next day, I'm in the hospital. And I get paged over the tannoy. And it was him. He wanted me. He wanted to go to talk to me." And he called up the hospital, he paged me there. And he said, "I want to take you out on a proper date." I said, "You thought it was romantic, right?" She said, "Yes, because I was in the shame of the one-night stand." And I said, "He, he knew that." And I said, "What's more is that he knows that you're somebody who, no, no, no, could be a yes. You didn't hold your boundary." And I said, "I'm not judging you or shaming you, but it's just an example again of, you tick every criteria on his, on his list." And really, his game, his strategic game of forcing women to fall in love with him was very strong, very, very, very strong. And that's why it's very difficult to detect.

And going back to the question about parole boards and probation, and they should be trained in this stuff, right? But unfortunately, when it comes to releasing offenders, they are solely focused on them. They're not focused on what they did to victims, and really what happened, and protecting the public, which is what they should be. They're not trained on psychopathy, and they're not trained to understand, you know, the key behaviors. And equally, what I will say is, you know, a lot of professionals do get sucked in, hoovered in by psychopaths. They want to believe them, and they want to help them. And they also want to be the one who helped them. "I have this connection with them, Laura. You don't understand. It's me who can help them. They're not that person anymore. They've told me things they've never told anybody, and I believe them." And I'm always very curious about that. Because if you've got a psychopath, they don't age out. You cannot cure them. There's no rehabilitation. There's nothing current day, as I sit here now, that we know works to cure a psychopath and render them safe to be out in the public. They just get better at hiding it as they get older. Correct. We just give them the blueprint of how not to get caught again, and what they need to say when they do get caught. So they get better. They learn their tradecraft. And that's what I call it. It's a tradecraft. And everything is about notching up knowledge of how to get better at what they do, and how to exploit, and how to have power and control over people, and dominate people. And their biggest kick is when they get the police officer, the probation officer, the parole board fighting their corner that they've changed. And many of them find religion in prison, you know, they're now evangelical and they're religious. And psychopaths don't age out. I've seen men in their 70s, 80s, still committing sexual offenses. And it's women and children who pay that price.

Thank you for keep sharing this. I can't imagine how hard it is to live it and go through it every day. And part of, um, if it's okay that I can share this, that just before we've got on camera, one of the things you said is, "We're now giving them information of what we women are looking out for." And so I do understand that sometimes, even the information that we're sharing to help women can end up being a double-edged sword because, yes, we're helping women get the tools and tactics, but also we're giving the men who are, um, psychopaths, the knowledge of what we know about them. I think it could be very useful for, uh, the people watching to kind of have this checklist. And then I would love to go into coercive control and how coercive control really is almost the beginning to the trap that we're talking about.

So you have to link these things together. A psychopath doesn't just do one thing. They're always looking. They're always on the make. They're always looking for the, the, the next target, the next thing that they're doing. So that's where criminal versatility comes in. They would do lots of different things. John Meehan is very interesting because many police forces investigated him here in America. No one joined up his serial offending behavior until one female detective got involved. But he knew how to work the system. So even on one of the times after an assault, he turns up to court, female judge, and he says, "Oh, you know, I've got dogs, and I haven't sorted them out. So I understand you're going to put, send me to, but can you just give me a day to just get my dog sorted out?" Well, everyone loves animals, don't they? So she's like, "Okay, I'll give you 23 hours." And that's what she gave him. And he wreaked havoc in those 23 hours. So he understood the system very well. He'd never served time, um, hard time. Even though the short sentence that he had on that occasion, he came out of prison, and he, that's when he met Deborah Newell. And the, the night afterwards, he was on a dating site, put a picture up of him in scrubs with a tan, and meets Deborah. They end up going on a date. "Oh, can I come back to yours?" And she says, "Yes." Wow.

So the versatility that they're just, they're getting arrested, they're getting off, they're getting arrested. Just is an indication they have zero respect for the law or for anything that goes beyond what they care about and want.

Correct. Yeah. And sometimes it might look quite small. With John, it was drugs. You know, he was a drug addict, and he was using, and he was stealing from the hospital. And we suspect there were multiple murders as well. Wow. That we just don't know about. Well, the, at the time, weren't investigated as murders, like his father and his brother, who he was sending drugs to. And the possibility, yes, of other women. And none of this came out until he became the official Dirty John that we all know. Correct. Wow. They all believed his story, um, because he sounded so plausible. And that's always the challenge. Do you really know who you're living with? And the minute you get that inkling, something's off, which T, T did, then follow it. And that's why the coercive control law is so important for there to be a law for men like him.

That is the crime, the indictment, the threats. I mean, Deborah couldn't even get a restraining order, couldn't even get a protective order, which is just bonkers. And there was no officer joining up all his history across the states in America. And that's part of the work I've been doing on serial perpetrators. Why aren't we joining up serial domestic abusers and stalkers and having their data and their information all on one database like sex offenders and terrorists? Because these men are terrorists. They terrorize many women and children, and we don't do anything to stop that.

Yeah, God, there's so much there. Um, the idea of this coming out only because something even more horrific happened is horrifying. And in your story, as you were talking, I was just like, going back to this list of how many things, um, that he has done that is on your list. I mean, lack of remorse and guilt, conning and lack of sincerity, short-tempered, poor behavioral control, early behavior problems, impulsivity, lack of realistic or long-term plans. Like, all of these things really do highlight, if we know what to look out for, then maybe we can start to protect ourselves.

So, apart from this list as well, you've spoken about many times in this talk about coercive control. From what I understand, and I'd love for you to explain more, it's the master manipulation that no one sees coming. That if you speak up about it, people just think, "Oh, you're going crazy. What are you talking about?" That's part of the master of the trap. So, what are the things that make up coercive control? What are the actions? And then, how is that the master trap for us women?

Yeah, excellent question. And that's what's missing off the psychopathy checklist right there. Dr. Robert Hare has 20 traits, but power and control and coercive control, that is the motivation of the psychopath. And we have to make this connection. When it happens, and a coercive controller will do that. They will set the trap. When you first meet them, they will be all the things, right? They will be too good to be true. And even Deborah said he was too good to be true. And I said, "And that is true, Deborah." You know, so I have to be very clear. When I work with people, don't sugarcoat things. I am a very direct communicator. If someone is too good to be true, do your due diligence. Often, they really try and increase likability through the charm approach. You know, "You're not like other women. You're just incredible." They will give you everything that you value that makes you feel amazing, and you feel so special. You feel so seen by this person. It's like it was meant to be. "Laura, he just knew things, and we just matched. It was like we were meant to be together." And they will say that too. They will keep repeating those things back.

Let's say six months down the line, because honeymoons, it does tend to be in that six-month window, right? Um, there might be a change. And I'll use it with an example of Alice Ruggles, a case that still haunts me. Of a young woman who's very vivacious, great personality, jokester, prankster. And then she met this guy called Triman Harry Dylan, and he was in the military. And my first question, once I understood the case, was, "How did they meet?" He found her on Facebook, going through his friend's friends, and he sends her a message. He said, "You're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. I would love to talk to you." So Alice feels special, right? So that's a prime example. You feel special, you feel seen.

Before you go on, would it be specifically work more on people that aren't obviously beautiful? Because if you're really beautiful, and you get it every single day, you'd be like, "Uh-huh, thank you," and move on. Is that part of the trap?

Yeah, I mean, it can be. It's tailor-made. So you're exactly right to pick up at that point. So whatever it is that they see that you value, right? They will tailor-make it to that. And that's what makes coercive control and psychopaths so dangerous, that it's idiosyncratic. The same thing never repeats over and over. So that's a really good pickup point. And that's why every case has to be looked at on its own merit. So for Alice, yes, she was attractive, but he really leaned into that. She was young, just finishing university, so not much life experience in terms of dating. And he says all these things that make her feel great. So she starts dating him. But within, I think it's about four months, he starts to say things like, "Wow, your nose is really big. Has anyone ever said that to you before?" And so, you know, she's kind of like, "Oh, that feels really incongruent to all the other things." She doesn't think that rationally, but of course, it feels very jarring. And then he says things like, "Your arms are really hairy. Has anyone ever said that? My God, your arms are so hairy." He would pick up like things that just made Alice feel just so horrible about herself. And he would be jealous of her spending time with friends, and he would try and monopolize her time. So he would change from being this charming guy to then layering in these things, which left her feeling very confused. But her personality started to change, and her family and friends noticed that she was becoming withdrawn. She didn't want to go out. There were always these arguments between them. So within a six-month window, it was very evident to family and friends. But they didn't ask, you know, when women start to lose weight, you get complimented. Well, we shouldn't compliment. We should find out the reason why they're losing weight. She was losing weight because of him. And he does end up, after she has rejected him, he decides that he's going to kill her. A pre-meditated murder, and stabs her many times. And her best friend finds her dead.

And why did he kill her? Sorry, maybe I missed something. What was the catalyst to that?

Well, rejection. And rejection and revenge for the psychopath. You know, "I can do what I want. I can cheat on you." And they will, they will be very sexually promiscuous. They would do all of these things. But the double standard is, you cannot do that, and you cannot reject them. And if you do, the diabolical nature of these individuals, I really cannot underline that enough. It's like a switch that goes, and they want revenge, and they are vengeful, and they will kill on that basis. And Trond Harry Dylan stabbed her many, many times. He drove up to Edinburgh, goes out on a date. Oh my God, that's the callous disregard you see. As soon as I learned that, I knew he was a psychopath. And that's what I'm talking about. No empathy, no remorse. Never gave her a second thought. Killed her in the bloodiest of ways, knife wet work, stalked her before that, made her life absolutely miserable, and he just, just goes out on a date.

There's a stat actually that I have. So you've said for somebody to leave, it takes them often seven to eight tries to actually finally leave. I assume that's because of the web of manipulation that they're in. But then the stat is, 75% of women murdered by an intimate partner were killed after attempting to leave the relationship.

Yeah. Now, if I told you the odds of you getting in a car, 76% chance you're going to crash and die, would you? No. So we, as women, should think very carefully about the men in our lives. Because we're educated about the stranger danger, right? Yeah, yeah. And even then, we don't always trust our instinct. But we're, it's actually the men in our lives danger that we should be educating. We should be doing healthy relationship education. Of jealous and controlling behavior is a big red flag. And you know, we're talking when girls and boys start to date, which now happens, you know, early, you know, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, that's when we should be talking about this and giving boys the skills. Um, and letting both boys and girls know that jealousy and control is not love. And often young girls see it as love, and it's not a healthy relationship. And love is all about letting go, right? If you love someone, you let them, let them go. But this psychopathology is about making someone's world small and controlling every facet of their life. And that's not healthy.

And we were taught in school, at least I was, at the age that I am, is that if boys pull your hair, it means they like you. So you've learned to somewhat attach abuse, whether it's emotional, mental, physical abuse, to, "Oh, they must like me. They must really like me." To get this jolt. I used to think that before I met my husband, with this, my toxic ex-boyfriend, he would disrupt every moment if I even spoke to a boy. And I was in college. And in the moments, because I had had low self-esteem, I told myself in that moment, "Wow, look how much he loves you. He's willing to go that extreme because he loves you that much."

So, you call coercive control "unfreedom." That word really hit me. "Unfreedom" hit me so hard of really describing exactly what it is. And in the story you just said, is the isolation. It's cutting you off from people around you so that other people's opinions can't start to penetrate and override, I assume, the psychopaths or the person that you're with. With, uh, monitoring and surveillance. So how often do you find that to be true of making sure people just like, "Text me, call me, where are you?"

Every case, really. Every case, every case. I can't think of any. You know, and the reasons given, because the woman would justify to me, "Oh, but he was cheated on in his last relationship, Laura." And I'll say, "Whose voice are you now presenting to me?" And that's how I know he's in her head, because she's now defending him and giving him the justification to behave like this, because that's what he's telling her. With trust in a relationship, trust and respect, the cornerstone and foundation of a relationship. And if you don't have that, red flag.

Wasn't that, I think you actually said that, um, in one case, the woman was somewhat pressured and forced into always taking selfies to make sure that she was in her pajamas, in her house, in her bed?

I've had women have to flush the toilet because the toilet flushes in a certain way. So Levi Bellfield would force one, in particular, to flush the toilet so that he knew that she was in the house at all times. And that's not a rational thing, right? But someone would tell you in the cold light of day, and they'd say, "But it's fine." And that's how women are living their lives to appease the consequence of whatever it is that's going to happen. They're walking on eggshells. They're doing these, what are quite extraordinary things, to keep the peace. So if you're operating through the prism of somebody else's lens, and you're fearful, that's coercive control.

We have this understanding that we work out, "Okay, my job to do the dishwasher, yours to put the bins out, yours to do." We all do that to keep the home going, right? You have to work as a team. The difference is, for me, in my home, there's no fear of consequence if someone doesn't do that. It's annoying if they don't do the thing that needs to be done, but there's not a fear of consequence. So that, again, is how you understand whether something is about coercive control. And it's not toxic behavior, it's abuse. And we must call it abuse. And it's not an abusive relationship, because a relationship is a construct. It's an abuser. So all of our language masks who the abuser is. And that's something, you know, for me, language. When I train professionals, when I'm on my podcast, I'm very clear. You know, if someone says "abusive relationship," and I'll say, "Who's the abuser?" And they go, "Oh." Because now you have to name them. So once you name them, you know who the problem is. But too often, our language, it's their part of patriarchy to mask who the problem is. And if you say "abusive relationship," and now you're saying it's half a dozen of one, half a dozen of the other.

So true. Yes. So is it, that's what I always ask. So, is it what's really going on here? And that's where the DASH is very important, of going through the risk questions with someone. So, take me through the DASH, actually, if you don't mind.

So, is the victim very scared? Are you very scared? So it's not about how you feel, because range of emotions over time. This is about fear. And if there's extreme fear, if they made you, you know, they were driving in a quiet car, they were so reckless. Laura, I told them to stop, and they just sped up because they were enjoying the fear to control. So it's not a question on there, it says, "Do they drive recklessly?" It's about, "Do they put you in fear?" And are you now wanting to exit the relationship? Move to one side of the country because this person, because they said they're going to kill you? When they say they do things, they are the psychopath who does it, right? That's a very important question. And if you're fearful, what are you fearful of? Nine times out of 10, that victim knows exactly what's going to happen next. "Where he said he killed the children. He said, 'If I report him to police, he'll kill my children, and I'll never see them again.'" That will stop her from going ahead to the next step. If she genuinely believes that this man, when he says he does something, because she's the expert, he does it. So victim's perception of, um, and and fear levels. Stalking, you know, and it's not a question, "Do they stalk you?" It breaks down lots of different types of behavior, because we know stalking is a high-risk behavior.

You call it psychological terrorism, I believe.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it is terrorism. That's what someone's trying to do. They're trying to scare the bejesus out of you and let you know they're going to be here, there, and everywhere. And it's very intrusive when you're being stalked. And it will be online, it will be offline. It will be, at some point, if it's real stalking, the obsession and fixation means they will want to get up close and personal at some point.

Before Trond Harry Dylan murdered Alice, he appeared in her garden. And she's lying in her bed. And I always tell police officers and others, the story when they say, "Oh, yeah, he sent flowers and chocolates." And I say, "He didn't send flowers and chocolates. What did he do?" And I get them to break it down step by step. He appeared in the middle of the night. It's terrifying for a woman. They hear a noise in the middle of the night in the garden. Now, you're in her shoes, because I want to put them in her shoes. And now they start to understand. She goes downstairs, pulls open the curtain, and there he is. And he stood there, and he has his hands up like this, and he's going like that, pointing down. And her natural instinct is, you know, absolute terror. The guy who is terrorizing me, he's out there dressed in black. What's he going to do? And it's flowers and chocolates. So she tells the core handler, "It's flowers and chocolates." "Oh, that's romantic, isn't it?" Because that's what the police thought. Well, what's wrong with that? Well, it's the middle of the night. Why doesn't he use Interflora? Why doesn't he send flowers at 3 p.m. in the afternoon? Why does it have to be in the middle of the night? What's his real message?

And when you say police, I assume you mean male police?

I mean, I train all officers. And actually, even with women, sometimes they don't get it. And I have to wake them up. I call it the creep-o-meter. We all have one, right? We all have a creep-o-meter. That unfortunately, if you work these cases all the time, it can get desensitized and anesthetized. And the thing with my work is, I have to be in the middle. I can't become too anesthetized, and nor can they. And I can't equally be oversensitive. It's a really hard line. But unfortunately, too often, professionals' creep-o-meters aren't working anymore. And in my classes, I wake them the hell up. Because if that's your daughter, if that's you, and this is happening, this is creepy. And this guy is intentionally trying to terrorize her and make her feel unsafe in her own home and her own bed. That his real message is, "I can get to you whenever I want to." And we missed that nine times out of 10 with stalking cases.

And that's something to your point about the creep-o-meter, that it was flowers and chocolates. Like, that makes it even more creepy than him being out by himself just in a garden.

Yeah. So that's not romance. But these are the things that are buried deep in all of us, culturally rooted to say, "Oh, well, it's just flowers and chocolates. What's the big deal?" You know, "What, Laura? Men can't win. He's trying to do a nice thing here." And I always have to retell the story in a way, true to its narrative, and what the intention is. And I get them to tell me the intention. What's his real message? The message is, "I can get to you at any time." So it's like unraveling, you know, something that we all think we understand, but we unravel it. So now this is really creepy stuff. This is a marker that this man is escalating, and he was a very serious risk to Alice.

Well, she knew this. That's why she's calling the police for help. And they're trying to put her down the civil route, even though stalking was already a crime. And if you have a restraining order that says they can't come within 200 meters, they'll be there at 201. There's nothing we can do, Laura, because he's at 201, and it's 200. They will play the game in every way, shape, and form. Which is why you need people like me, criminal behavioral analysts, forensic psychologists, who are experts in this stuff, to help with the interviews, to help with the investigative strategy, to help the victim. So we want women to report. We want them to stand firm and have advocates who stand firm with them to say, "This is the DASH risk assessment. Stalking is high risk. One in two stalkers act on that threat when they've had a relationship with the victim. One in two." Coercive control, there are over half the questions in the toolkit relate to coercive control. Everything from animals being abused, threatened, to financial abuse. And most coercive control is financial abuse.

I've got a question for you. Do you think P. Diddy is a psychopath?

I believe he is. And the biggest markers for me, uh, the need to have power and control and utterly dominate, and the lack of remorse. The switch that goes with Cassie. And we all saw the video, right? I mean, you see that video. He does that in a hotel corridor, not fearful of the consequences. What does he do behind closed doors? And it's men's and women's accounts. And I believe what they're saying, Lisa. I don't have any reason to doubt why so many people would describe such specific things. And yes, a top-level manipulator and coercive controller. Their sole motivation is power and control. Dominate or be dominated. And going back to his childhood, his best friend said he was someone who was bullied and was never going to be a victim. He carved his way to success in everything that he did. And so they find themselves. Jeffrey Epstein came from nothing, makes himself into this invaluable person that everyone believes. Never even checked his credentials. So they find themselves, they work their way into power. And a lot of it is, you know, a lot of bluster, as in they talk a good game, but they can be talented too. And look, P. Diddy, a very talented musician, right? But the way he treated people, particularly women, his internalized, uh, misogyny and hatred of women. When looking at his childhood, I can see where it came from.

Oh, what did you see? How do you correlate?

Well, he's punishing women, right? So the things that he's saying, and what he's reported as saying by best friends, by drivers, by, you know, his, uh, security detail. He would say things like, "These hoes need to know who's boss." Well, why does he describe women like that? As hoes? That means he holds women in such low regard. And "they need to know who's boss." That puts him in a master-servant relationship, right? And then you hear accounts of actually his childhood. His mother was incredible, of being a single mother because the dad ended up being shot, gangland, drugs-related. Although he was never told that. His mom had to be, uh, tough love. She had to be mom and dad with him. So when she becomes a disciplinarian, that doesn't sit well with a lot of boys as they get older. They resent it. And that resentment can turn into this level of misogyny and hatred to women. So when he's punishing Cassie, when he's doing these things, storming into the club, and he's grabbing her handbag, bearing in mind he was dating as well as, uh, with his girlfriend at the time, I think it was Kim Porter, but he makes a beeline for her. He shouts at her. Every woman who's with her is scared. They're all in fear. He gets her handbag, he opens it, he empties it out. He's trying to devalue her. He's trying to humiliate her. He's trying to control her. He wants to punish her. And it's when you see that level of punishment, and you need to teach women a lesson, that's top-level misogyny and hatred. And there's probably much more that's going to come out about him.

When I saw the video of him just kicking the F out of her, I go, "How the hell do you go back?" Is that the level of manipulation where it comes to coercive control, where it's like, even when that happens, you choose A) not to leave, and B) not to tell people? I mean, maybe she did tell people, and I just don't know. But I just try to rack my head around, how does someone get away with that? Extreme fear, fear and shame, and feeling that you're not going to be believed. When you've got someone like P. Diddy, who's so talented, people loved him. And they, she, and others felt he could make people disappear. Why do they think that?

It's most likely because they've seen it. Okay? You take the shooting that happened. That Shine ended up serving 10 years for. The gun was in P. Diddy's hand. And I would, the victim sees and says right from the start, when she was shot in the face, it was he who shot her. The driver of his car also gave evidence. And yet somehow, he's not found guilty, but Shine is. That sends a message out to everybody of power, right? That's just one thing. But the documentary opens up, you know, with another woman talking about him beating Cassie in front of her. You've got another woman who's the editor of Vibe, who put him on the front cover. And because she wouldn't show him the front cover, he made a death threat to her, saying she'd end up in the boot, in a trunk. And her attorney calls him up and says, "You know, retract that." Which he does. He then sends two goons to try and find her. She was in such fear, Lisa. She believed he was going to kill her, as did everyone who worked there. She's blanked it totally out of her memory bank. Fear is what keeps people, uh, quiet, silent. And, you know, those, those who he allegedly raped, or the accounts that they've given are so specific, so detailed. And I have no reason not to believe them when you've got congruence, when you've got consistency. And so for Cassie, you've got to bear in mind, she was 19 when she met him. He's this big deal. He's signing her on a record label, right? For 10 years. He beats the hell out of her. Well, of course, that's not the first time. And she does leave. But he uses all his attorneys and all his people to call her up. She's in breach of contract. She's in the spider's web now. She can't get out. So it took her a long time to find her voice, to be able to say what happened. And then when she did, in the lawsuit, he settles within 24 hours. And everyone says she's a gold digger. But then we see the tape, right? And we see with our own eyes. And by the way, I never believed she was a gold digger. I believed her account. When you read that suit, everything in it was specific and detailed and credible. But we see the video. And then we find out he had paid someone to get that video. All the things that he put in place to suppress. You're talking about a top-tier coercive controller, and I believe psychopath, given the switch it goes on and off.

So back to your original question, for him, the switch goes on and off. He's done his control mechanism because it's not just about anger. This is about ensuring control. That he has ultimate domination and control of Cassie and others. But he can just go back to then ordering a kebab or whatever it might be, and he'll just go about his day without a second thought. And that is the sign of a psychopath. No remorse, no empathy, no responsibility-taking, pathological lying. If you're confronted, "Never happened. Take my gun. It was you." And they believe their own lie. "It was the driver who had the gun," or whoever he wants to. That's power. That's ultimate domination, power, and control. Not just of people, it's grooming all the people around him. And whatever happened in the criminal justice system, how he got away with it, because he was put before the court many, many times, but he never served. So what's going on there? What do you think is going on there?

Well, people are persuaded by his argument because he is very good at the charm offensive. And we believe men. And he says he didn't do it. She said he did. Well, she has to produce all the evidence, the videos, and everything else. So we do lean into believing men. But when they're a powerful man, he offered 50 grand to his driver. This is what the driver said, to say that the gun was in his hand, it was his gun. 50 grand. That's a lot of money to a driver, right? But he didn't take it. He gave evidence. How many other people has he offered money to to suppress the truth? How many officials? How many people believe his celebrity status? Like O.J. Simpson, you know, I have it on first account that when he was put into the jail after Nicole and Ron were murdered, he was treated like a rock star. Wow. Really? First account from people who were in there, where officers were asking him to sign things. And that's they believe in their own power and importance because other people, um, lift them up, enable them, are complicit. And often it's because of fear. So we have to look at what those mechanisms are. It can be about fear. But what if it's about greed? That they have something to benefit from it? Are they now complicit?

So coercive control, you have to look at who's in the web. And that's why I always say, coercive control is about what's going on between these two people. But it's also about, how does she remain entrapped in there? We have to look at the rest of the spider's web around of who's keeping her entrapped. What are the structured inequalities that keep her entrapped? What about all the debt that he's run up that keeps her entrapped? What about the fact when she speaks her truth, no one believes her, but they believe him? That keeps her silent. What about, "Well, if it happened, she would have told us earlier." You know, all the things that victim-blame and shame, the perpetrators know about, particularly psychopaths, and they leverage all of those things. And the big, the biggest fear for the victim, and the fame part of it.

So everything that you just said makes so much sense. But then they added fame. Because I would wonder, I'm going to say that, I'm not saying that they're involved, please, please don't clip me in the wrong way. But let's say, for instance, he was with someone that was just as famous. Let's even take J.Lo. If J.Lo turned around again, guys, I'm just hypothesizing, it's not actually true. But if J.Lo turned around and was like, "He abused me, he hit me, he did this, he did that," I think we'd believe her more. Not necessarily more as P. Diddy, but I think it would carry, sadly, more weight than Cassie. So you have someone that's super powerful like P. Diddy. I mean, super. He had the key to the city. So how many people does he have in his pocket from the government? I don't even know. That's obviously speculation right now. Nothing has been proved. But he's got the key to the city. And so you're more likely, because you've already got this preconceived notion of who P. Diddy is. I mean, I grew up with him, right? I was born in '79, so I remember all of his music. I was obsessed with him and his group and his bands and all the people he made amazing music. Yes, he had a talent. And that talent in the music ties to emotion. Because when I hear a song by P. Diddy, it reminds me of my college years, right? So there's all this emotion and connection to this person versus someone that, God, it's heartbreaking, but Cassie, which people don't have that connection to. So that's why I then go, would it be different if it was someone that was just as famous, that had just as much sway and power as P. Diddy? And now, actually, the manipulation wouldn't be as strong on your everyday person like us.

Yeah, and it's a really good point. And that emotional investment that we have when we've been on that person's journey, right? It's all tied in, um, to who we believe. So, you know, I wonder how many victims there really are. How many people would speak out? How many people have been complicit and enabled and being part of it because they were so fearful, fearful to lose their own job? And that's what we often see with coercive control. But they will pick out, "Not you, not you, but you." And that's when it comes down to that malleability, compliance checking. You know, so for women, I always say, have strong boundaries right from the start. Your "no" is a "no." Do not waver. The "no" is a "no." "Thank you very much. I wish you well. I don't want to see you again, but I hope you have a nice life. And I've really enjoyed meeting you, but it's just not the right time for me." So send them on their way with something nice, but make sure your "no" is the "no."

So with things like that, "no" is a "no." Setting boundaries. Doing that in public. Like, what are those other little things that if someone's watching right now, if they meet the P. Diddys of the world, what are the things they can do to protect themselves?

Well, firstly, trust your gut. That moment where, "Oh no, well, I should do it because otherwise it would make me look rude if I don't take the drink." Because we all have that moment. Actually, no, I don't want a drink. I don't want to drink in the day. And why would I drink with this guy who I don't really know? So it's a "no." And you just say "no." It's a complete sentence. Anything that you end up doing that you would not normally do is really the manipulation. And the art of manipulation is someone making you do things, and you don't even realize you're doing it. That is the art of the manipulation. So it always, for me, goes back to trust your gut. What's that initial instinct of your sum of all your learning, your knowledge, your read of the situation, which other people can't read because they're not there? It might be a micro-expression, something you saw on his face, a smirk, a triumph, or something you weren't sure about that made you feel uneasy. Follow that uneasiness. And it's a "no" from me. God bless. See you later. Because that's the "no." And we always hear those cases where they did that thing, and then they live with that regret. So you can still stay polite in your, you know, and pro-social in your "no," but having firm boundaries. They don't like that. And they don't like the fact, you know, they realize that you're someone who will not, you're immovable. And often women are movable. And that's what they're looking for. And with a stronger woman, sometimes that's the challenge, right? They like the challenge. And I mean, a stronger woman with stronger boundaries, they like that challenge, the thrill of the chase. That can equally be. So again, as you're going along your dating, and your, your months, and hopefully it goes well over a year where you've seen them in every situation, still, if there are those red flags, pay attention to them. Don't just stay with the green flags of what are the things that look good. Go with the ones that are uncomfortable and really pay attention, attention to them. And put them to the test. Do it in a safe way, though.

I do not want this discussion to end. Laura, thank you for all of the work that you do for women. Um, I said this at the beginning, but it is so powerful. I really want to say it again. How you show up every day, the fact that you've dedicated your life to this. I can only imagine how hard it is on a daily basis for you. And for you to show up every day and still do the work that you do in order to literally save women's lives. Girl, thank you. Thank you on behalf of every woman that is watching this right now. Thank you. And I feel like my job is well done if someone has seen this and it saved their life, whether it saved their life in an emotional relationship, all the way to stalking, all the way to murder, which is the thing that you deal with. So thank you. Keep doing what you're doing. I hope every single woman that is watching this, guys, throw her some love. Throw her support. Where can people follow you and actually give the support that you need in order to show up every day?

Well, people can follow me, of course, on all the socials. I probably spend more time on Instagram right now. So @crimeanalyst or @laurarichards999. Uh, crime analyst podcast is everywhere. But I also have the crime analyst squad, which is on Patreon. So patreon.com, no, yeah, patreon.com/crimeanalyst. And there, you know, there's lots of people who they're not just interested in hearing stories about horrible violence and murders. They actually want to do something about it. So I think now, in the true crime space, and this is what I try and fire up people into wanting to be an activist and to take action, because it's incumbent on all of us, right? It's not just about what the police do or, you know, what the courts do. It's actually incumbent upon all of us. So all my trainings are for everybody as well. And together, we can really make a difference. So it's not just about what I'm doing, it's about having conversations with you, reaching new audiences, um, and being able to talk honestly and authentically about our experiences. And I think with the advent of, you know, more and more trolling online, and I do get called a man-hater and people try and derail the conversation. So that's also why I created the crime analyst squad, so we can have these conversations. Because even for fathers and, uh, brothers and cousins and friends, you know, they might not think this is their problem, but it really is. It's not a women's issue. It's actually a man's issue. And you, it's devastating when I have to work with dads and brothers whose daughter and sister has been murdered, and then they're galvanized into action, and then they suddenly see all of this that I've been seeing for, and women have been seeing for a very long time. So you, as I say to all men, every woman has a scary story. Many have, and I promise, multiple stories that are scary about men. And they may not have even shared that with you before. So, you know, for women to share those stories with their loved ones, because it's us that walk with the key in our hand, who call each other to make sure we get home okay. And, you know, I don't want to be working with the family member after the murder, and then we try and pick things up and change laws and everything else. But victims will talk to their family and friends first of all. So educate yourself. And, you know, that's why I put all of this out in the mainstream, because it's not just to sit with me of, "Oh, aren't I clever? I've learned all of this stuff over the years." It's actually about mainstreaming it, so everyone can take action and be an activist and challenge, not just bad behavior, but abusive behavior, and be an advocate for someone who may not have their voice at the moment.

Guys, guys, a woman came up to me in the street one day, tapped me on the shoulder, and burst into tears. She told me she watched one of our episodes here at Women of Impact, where she was so scared of her husband because he wouldn't let her sing and dance in the house. She heard the interview, she believed change was possible. She took her four children and went and rented a one-bedroom apartment. And the very first thing she did on day one is her and her kids sung and danced. From that day forth, I vowed I would help women on their path to get out of these situations. That I would help women, and I would bring on guests that would help you figure out the manipulation tactics that's being worked on you, figure out the signs that maybe you are in a coercive controlling relationship that you may not even know. And goddamn, Laura Richards has delivered in spades today. So guys, please, please do go follow her and all the work that she's doing. If we stand together, united, could you imagine what world we would live in? Guys, guys, thank you so much for joining. If you're not subscribed, click that subscribe button down there. And until next time, be the hero of your own life. Peace.

If you want to learn more about coercive control, then click here right now. So you actually married to the real-life Wolf of Wall Street? You were manipulated, dominated, threatened, intimidated, gaslit, abused, love-bombed in your relationship.