Repeat Sex Offender A "Sexual Sadist"

Burgmann may be 'sexual sadist': doctor
Jana G. Pruden, Leader-PostPublished: Tuesday, December 11, 2007
A forensic psychiatrist says he believes convicted sex offender Randy Burgmann may be a sexual sadist who derives pleasure from the violent suffering or humiliation of women.
But Dr. Shabehram Lohrasbe also said he cannot be sure of the diagnosis because Burgmann refused to discuss certain subjects when the two met for Lohrasbe's court-ordered assessment.
Testifying at Burgmann's dangerous offender hearing on Monday morning, Lohrasbe said he met with Burgmann for about 21/2 hours in March 2006, and found him to be polite but "unreachable."

"I found him to be hollow in emotion. He would talk about things but it was an emotional vacuum ...," Lohrasbe said. "I was struck by the fact that he didn't seem to have any emotion even when he was talking about himself."

Lohrasbe said Burgmann also refused to talk about several important issues, including his most recent offence, some of the information on his prison file, and his childhood abuse.
Burgmann previously reported being sexually abused by his grandmother and another woman, and then physically abused by males and females, as a child. The 45-year-old repeat sex offender wouldn't expand on these experiences in his meeting with Lohrasbe, but the doctor said Burgmann exhibits signs of physical and sexual abuse in childhood.

Burgmann also denied having snuff or murder fantasies -- which he has admitted to in the past -- and claimed that some of the information on file about him was incorrect or wrongly attributed, Lohrasbe said.

The doctor testified that the possibility of sadism and sexual sadism is of grave concern, and Burgmann exhibits signs of both behaviours. Lohrasbe said Burgmann also has anti-social personality disorder and psychopathic tendencies, and seemed "quite convinced" that he has made all the changes he needs to make.

"He doesn't seem to be a man who's really searching or really troubled by what's going on inside him," Lohrasbe said.

The doctor testified that Burgmann has a lot of risk factors, including the patterns of his past offences, the extreme violence against his victims, and an apparent escalation of his offences.
His most recent offence occurred in March 2004, when he sexually assaulted a woman and left her bleeding in a back alley with serious injuries to her vagina.

Lohrasbe was the Crown's final witness in Burgmann's dangerous offender hearing.
Prosecutor Jeff Kalmakoff and defence lawyer Bruce Campbell are expected to make their closing submissions to Court of Queen's Bench Justice Catherine Dawson on Wednesday.
If declared a dangerous offender, Burgmann will receive an indeterminate prison sentence subject to periodic reviews. Dawson may also impose a fixed sentence or find Burgmann a long-term offender, which would see him serve a prison term followed by a lengthy period of supervision in the community.