A Diagnosed Sociopath Says Her Disorder Made Her A 'Great Lawyer'

That lawyer has written a book called "Confessions of a Sociopath" with the byline M.E. Thomas, revealing how a person with homicidal impulses can thrive in the law.

Sociopaths generally have a lot of superficial charm and lack of remorse or shame, according to Psychology Today, which excerpted the book.

Thomas, whose real identity isn't clear, described what it was like to work as a prosecutor. From the excerpt:

"My sociopathic traits make me a particularly excellent trial lawyer. I'm cool under pressure. I feel no guilt or compunction, which is handy in such a dirty business. Misdemeanor prosecutors almost always have to walk into a trial with cases they've never worked on before. All you can do is bluff and hope that you'll be able to scramble through it. The thing with sociopaths is that we are largely unaffected by fear."

Her sociopathy — and the fearlessness that goes with it — runs deep. As an 8-year-old she nearly drowned in the ocean and laughed after she was rescued.

She also had homicidal fantasies as a child, including one about killing her dad:

"The first recurring dream I can remember was about killing him [my father] with my bare hands," she wrote. "There was something thrilling about the violence of it, smashing a door into his head repeatedly, smirking as he fell motionless to the floor."

Despite these early homicidal fantasies, Thomas grew up to be a successful law professor, lawyer, and even a Mormon Sunday school teacher. (She writes that the Mormon church is a "sociopath's dream" because everybody has had the "potential to be Godlike.")

She's never killed anyone, committed a serious crime, or been a victim of child-abuse. "Despite having imagined it many times," she writes, "I've never slit anyone's throat."

Head over to Psychology Today to read a longer excerpt of her book >