Forensic Psychiatry

mer

Individuals convicted by the court and found to have a severe mental disorder should, by law, generally not be sentenced to prison. To decide on the sentence in a criminal case, a court may request a forensic psychiatric screening (i.e. a section 7-investigation or §7) of the suspect. The Swedish National Board of Forensic Medicine’s Department of Forensic Psychiatry performs about 1,300 §7-investigations each year. An investigation takes about an hour to complete and the result determines whether a forensic psychiatric investigation is recommended.

A forensic psychiatric investigation of a detained person can take up to four weeks. The suspect is investigated by a team consisting of a forensic psychiatrist, a psychologist, a social investigator, and nursing staff. The final report from the investigation indicates whether the individual had a severe mental disorder, at the time of the crime and/or at the time of the investigation.

Approximately 500 individuals, suspected of having committed a serious crime that can result in a prison sentence, undergo a forensic psychiatric investigation each year. Approximately half of these are found to have a severe mental disorder and are therefore recommended psychiatric care rather than prison.

The Swedish National Board of Forensic Medicine’s two units for forensic psychiatry are located in Stockholm and Gothenburg.

Our psychiatric investigation are a service to the court

Our task, on behalf of the court, is to evaluate the mental state of an individual that have committed a serious crime. The court uses the results of the investigation to determine whether the sentence is to be prison or psychiatric care.

Consequently, a statement from the Swedish National Board of Forensic Medicine often plays a crucial role when the court sentences a person to prison or to psychiatric care.

Risk assessments

Our tasks also include conducting risk assessments of those sentenced to life in prison. Here we evaluate and assess the risk of the individual relapsing into criminal behaviour. The risk assessments are conducted in a way similar similar way to the forensic psychiatric investigations.