Katherine Knight: The Worst Female Murderer in Australian History - Essay Sample

Introduction

Katherine Knight is a woman considered to be the worst female murderer in the history of Australia. She is the first Australian female to be given a life sentence with no possibility of parole after killing her boyfriend in 2001. The gruesome manner in which he committed the killing, which involved stabbing the victim several times and skinning the corpse shocked the world. This essay looks at the strain theory and how it goes along with Knight's actions for murdering her boyfriend. It examines everything that led up to the events of that incident and how that relates to the strain theory.

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Strain theory is a concept that pressure resulting from social factors such as poor quality education or lack of an income source spurs individuals to commit offenses. Its main ideas were initially advanced by an American sociologist called Robert Merton in the 1930s. Merton's work on the concept became quite influential in the mid-twentieth century. Early strain theories mainly focused on marginalized groups whereby their common aspirations and failure to attain those goals was perceived as a driving factor for crime. For instance, poor people who earned little income could not realize common and socially-acceptable ambitions such as the 'American Dream' through legal means. Hence, they were forced to engage in criminal activities in order to attain their goals.

Americans had been influenced into believing that their social goals involved success and material wealth. A problem occurred in that equal access to such goals did not actually exist. There was a discrepancy between these goals and legally acceptable means of achieving them. People had been led into believing that the society consisted of a meritocracy whereby they could succeed and become wealthy if they worked hard. They responded to this discrepancy by making various adaptations, some of which involved engaging in criminal activities. While some individuals may conform and try to overcome difficulties to success by working hard, others may adapt. The adaptation likely to result in criminal activity is by those who still desire the material success but are unwilling to input the hard work. Such individuals will find another way to attain their goals that involves crime. Others may reject both the goal and the means of achieving it, and disappear from the society altogether. Merton referred to them as retreatists and suggested they may engage in offenses such as illegal drug use. Rebellion is another adaptation likely to result in criminal behavior. Certain individuals may opt to replace the goals and means with new ones, such as political violence or illegal protests.

Although the strain theory was based on America during the twentieth century, it is applicable to any modern developed western capitalist society. All in all, Merton did not think of where the social goals came from, or in whose interests the people were influenced into believing. The truth is that everybody wants money to buy consumer products, and they have been socialized into believing that working hard for their employers is the only way to achieve this goal. A problem occurs in that such reasoning is not a value consensus that ensures social solidarity. Rather, it is a form of hegemony or capitalist ideology that serves the interests of the elite few at the expense of the vast majority.

Perhaps the only shortcoming of the strain theory is that it does not explain why some people find it more difficult to achieve their goals than others. It seems Merton did not consider the fact that inequality and unequal opportunities pose a social problem within society, or what might cause such a problem. Also, he did not consider that various individuals have different adaptations. Although many people find it difficult to achieve their goals using socially acceptable means, only a small number decide to venture into crime. The strain theory should have at least tried to explain why most of the disadvantaged individuals abide by the law. Merton should have come up with a sociological explanation on why some individuals opt to innovate while others decide to innovate.

The strain theory fails to explain why certain groups of individuals are deviant in one way or another. As mentioned earlier, the vast majority of people are known to conform most of the time. However, those who don't conform often form social groups like gangs. While Merton did not address this, some functionalist subcultural theorists touched on it when they developed his theory. All in all, Merton did come up with possible explanations for certain kinds of crimes. The only ones he ignored are non-utilitarian crimes, which are criminal activities that criminals do not benefit materially from. While he offered an explanation for illegal activities such as drug abuse, his theory did not mention anything about crimes such as vandalism or assault. Lack of a source of income may encourage someone to commit a serious crime like armed robbery. However, there is no plausible reason why poverty can spur someone to assault someone or write vulgar graffiti.

Katherine Knight brutally murdered her partner John Price in October 2001, a crime for which she was convicted. It is the coldhearted and gruesome manner in which went about the murder that shocked the world. Knight stabbed the victim at least 37 times, skinned him and hung the skin in the living room using a meat hook. She went ahead and cut off his head, cooked several parts of the body, and served them to his young children during dinner. Given Knight's life history, it is possible to apply the strain theory to explain her motive for committing the shocking murder. There is no denying that she lived a life on the edge both while growing up and as an adult. She hailed from a rather wild family and was known to have a bad temper. She was involved in at least four rocky relationships in her adult life, and regularly assaulted three fathers to her children.

When she went to trial, Knight was diagnosed with psychological condition known as the borderline personality disorder. The condition is characterized by intense mood swings and violence, with sufferers known to get extremely agitated when subjected to the slightest provocation. It particularly affects individuals in intimate relationships as they are prone to paranoid suspicious that their partner is being unfaithful. These manifestations perhaps explain Knight's violent nature and poor relationships with men. Her violent tendencies were at times too much too much that her male partners would eventually kick her out after living together for a short time.

Looking into Knight's early life, there are several indicators that she was capable of committing murder. In the course of the years, she did display certain warning signs. She was born in a small town in New South Wales, Australia to a family of eight children. She has a twin sister and the two had a reputation of rough and violent behavior while in high school. While most teachers and students described her as nice and friendly when in a good mood, this personality abruptly changed when she was in a foul mood. Also, the Knight children, consisting of two girls and six boys, grew up in a home characterized by domestic violence.

Barbara, who was Knight's mother, had the four oldest boys with Jack, her first husband. She left him due to chronic gambling and drinking problems, and married Ken Knight with whom she had four more children. Barbara was to suffer violent abuse in this second marriage. Knight and her siblings became accustomed to seeing their mother with facial bruises and injuries until they didn't bother to ask questions anymore or even noticed. It is worth noting that children who regularly observe their mother being subjected to domestic assault ultimately become numb to such violence. To make matters worse, the violence was not just restricted to the parents. Knight stated that her elder brothers regularly abused her sexually while their parents took turns to harshly discipline them.

According to the strain theory, little or poor quality education can spur someone to commit criminal offenses. Knight was a rather poor student and dropped out of school when she was just sixteen years old. Since she was considered semi-illiterate, she could not gain formal employment. Such a situation left her with no choice but other family members working at a local slaughterhouse. She reportedly spent a lot of time watching the animals getting their throats slit, with some coworkers commenting how bizarre it was for her to do that. Most slaughterhouse employees were compassionate and ensured an animal's death was quick and painless. However, there were a few who enjoyed watching animals die a slow and painless death. Knight was apparently one of the few sadistic ones.

Over the course of her life, Knight was involved in four serious relationships. All her men seemingly loved her until they figured out her mental condition and violent tendencies. She was seemingly an excellent lover with a lot of enthusiasm, and possessed the qualities of a good wife. She had average housekeeping abilities and cooking skills. The only bad thing about her personality was the combination of a suspicious nature, possessiveness, and unpredictably violent outbursts. These behavioral traits would ultimately scare her men off, all of whom successfully managed to escape with their lives except one. John, Knight's latest and last husband, was good at tolerating her temperament as he thought that her good side would soon return. He had no idea that she was actually capable of committing murder.

David Kellet, who was Knight's first husband, stated that her mother once warned him that she had the potential to commit murder. Kellet and John actually met sometime in 1999 to talk about Knight's violent and erratic behavior. While John stated that he wanted to end the relationship, he claimed he was scared. A notable element of Knight's mental condition was a disturbing feeling of abandonment. If a partner said he would be back home by a specified time but ended up being late by fifteen minutes, she would become very agitated. She once knocked Kellet unconscious by hitting at the back the head with an iron bar for arriving home late. He had to be hospitalized in a coma for a couple of days, and surprisingly chose not to report the incident to law enforcement authorities.

The fact that Knight stabbed her husband multiple times highlights her morbid obsession with knives. Such fascination with blades is referred to as 'picarism'- a clinical term for an individual who is sexually aroused by the notion of stabbing, slicing or cutting skin. A person suffering from this condition is always fantasizing about piercing the skin with a knife. Given Knight's violent outbursts, her obsession with knives posed an immense danger. In one chilling incident, she sat astride Kellet's chest and grazed his throat, laughing and commenting how easily she could kill him. On their wedding night, she almost choked him due to what she alleged to be unsatisfactory sexual performance.

At one point, Knight was labeled 'the town's psycho' due to escalating psychotic behavior. She once carried an axe onto the streets, swinging it at anyone who came near her. She was also observed smashing her baby's pram into poles on the street and fences. In a particularly disturbing incident, Knight held a family hostage at a local service station at knifepoint, smashing windows and threatening a little boy in front of his shocked family. Reports indicated that she raided the service station simply because the owner had repaired a car belonging to her estranged husband, which he had used to flee from her. Police officers managed to handle the situation and sent her to the psychiatric wing of a local hospital.

Severely trauma...