Pieter Hintjens - The Psychopath Code - Cracking the Predators That Stalk Us

When Mallory threatens you, observe and take notes. Compare her threats to her actual actions. You will see that she rarely if ever does what she promises. If she does use violence, she gives no warning. When she uses violence, document it and use that against her. Emotional and psychological abuse are notoriously hard to prove. Bruises, bites, and broken bones can end in criminal charges.

Active disabling also has a mantra. This is: "If it is not locked down, expect to lose it."

Once you recognize Mallory, you must assume she will take whatever she wants. This means money and assets, for sure. It also means contacts, employees, documents, secrets. She may explain this using "yours, ours, mine" logic. Or she may deny it and blame someone else.

You must consider what assets you have that Mallory could divert. If you are business partners, and you are not in full control of money and decisions, abandon it. If you own property together, consult a lawyer. If you have joint accounts, close them. If she has access to your credit cards, get new ones. If she knows your passwords, change them. If you are a co-parent, keep the passports for your children locked up.

If you live with Mallory you must be careful and somewhat paranoid. Since she is opportunistic, this means locking things up. Do not be shy about using large locks, and hide the keys well. Do your research on identity theft. She may fake your signature and take out loans in your name. Assume she steals your post.

If she knows her way around computers, assume she tries to hack your computer and web accounts. Lock your PC screen when you are away. Use extra "two-factor" security on your web accounts. Do not let her borrow your phone. It takes only a few minutes to install spyware on a phone.

If Mallory is in your social circle, leave no money on the table. Expect her to use your friends and contacts for her own benefit. Warn them, and keep your most important contacts away from her. It is far better to warn your contacts about Mallory than to expose them to her.

When you start disabling Mallory, she will get hungry. This makes her more aggressive, and scarier. Yet it also makes it much easier to expose her. As you secure your boundaries, you can see when she violates them. This brings us to the next action, which is to collect evidence of her violations of norms and laws.

Mallory is a genius at using rules the wrong way. "Here are these complex rules which apply to you, yet not to me because I’m special," he says. It is strange how few of us question such unfairness. Perhaps we’ve learned the habit of lopsided obedience from school and work.

Good rules are simple, and apply to everyone in the same way. Luckily, no matter what Mallory claims or argues, most of society works this way. So if you document his rule violations over a period of time, that gives you real power. Again, this does take time, and patience.

What "material evidence" means depends on your case, and whether you expect one day to show it to a judge. For criminal or civil cases, learn the rules of evidence for your jurisdiction. In general, evidence must be verifiable, and you must collect it using legal means.

If you are in a serious conflict, speak to a private investigator as well as a lawyer. Collecting evidence is an investigator’s main job. They will explain the rules and perhaps help.

Here are some hints for collecting evidence:

❂ Email is excellent as evidence. It is hard or impossible to fake and a service like Gmail does the backup for you. Again, care for your passwords. Print out any critical emails and store in a safe place.

❂ Use email to confirm agreements with Mallory. "Just to confirm, we agreed that…" Ask Mallory to correct you if you misunderstood. This gives you a written trail.

❂ Video recordings are good evidence in most courts, as they are hard to fake. If you need to prove a history of verbal or physical abuse, video is one of the best tools. You can use your smartphone, or small hidden video recorders.

❂ Audio recordings are poor evidence in most courts. They can be good material in non-legal situations. They are easy to make, and share. Just use your smartphone’s voice recorder. You can buy small, cheap USB pen recorders online.

❂ Phone calls are better evidence than audio clips, if you use a call recorder on your smartphone. Tracking caller ID and date and time provides a good record.

❂ Before you record Mallory at all, learn the law. You could be committing a crime if he did not consent. It depends on the jurisdiction.

❂ If there are neutral witnesses to an event, try to get a signed and dated statement from them. Make a digital copy and back that up.

❂ Label your digital copies, and keep them safe and backed-up. You can use a cloud service like Dropbox though be paranoid about your passwords.

❂ Assume that Mallory is more paranoid than you, and will guess when you are recording him. You can turn this to your favor. He tends to behave much better when he thinks others are watching.

Going to court is an extreme and rare outcome. The main value in collecting evidence is more banal. As you build a file on Mallory, two things happen. First, you feel your power returning, and Mallory’s power weakening. Mallory also feels it. Second, you begin to understand Mallory’s deceptions as they are happening. You begin to learn his patterns. You can predict his next moves.

Over time you have learned Mallory’s patterns. You will start to predict her behavior. By explaining what is going on, and predicting what will happen next, you can stay grounded, and help others. You reduce the risk of getting caught in old narratives. I call this "providing subtitles."

Mallory acts like a chaos machine. She seems to show mad mood swings. She will be calm and relaxed one day, vicious and paranoid the next. It can look like a disorder. Anyone who sees this and isn’t familiar with it will ask, "what drugs is she on?"

The simplest explanation isn’t drug abuse nor a mental disorder. What seems like instability comes from two main factors. First, she gets into schemes and plots that she keeps hidden from you. If she appears calm it’s because her focus is somewhere else. When these schemes turn sour, as they often do, she attacks anyone who gets in her way. That will be you.

Second, she responds to displays of weakness with aggression. And what social humans consider "being nice," Mallory considers "being weak." She also responds to anger with fury. Mallory responds to any display of emotion with her predator emotions.

This creates chaotic feedback cycles so that there is no stability. This sounds terrible, and it can be. Yet we can now predict the weather, from day to day. By warning others in your group, you help them take distance when the inevitable happens.

As you see Mallory manipulate others, you can explain:

❂ She’s making promises she has no intention of keeping. She wants you to be off your guard. Get ready for the inevitable excuses.

❂ She’s said something tangible. It is a lie. She’s hiding something or trying to confuse you. Make a note, and we’ll see the lie exposed later.

❂ She’s making accusations. She’s afraid of something and is attacking as cover. Note her accusations, she’s talking about herself without realizing it.

❂ She’s asked for something small. She’s nudging you to face the right way. If you give it to her, she’ll attack you and demand a larger service.

❂ She’s making threats of retribution. She’s pushing you to do what she wants. She’s bluffing. Note it, and you’ll see. She won’t dare. Her threats are things she is afraid of.

❂ She’s intimidating you with verbal abuse and lies about your behavior. She’s trying to make you afraid and insecure. Don’t let your fear control you.