Hypnotized to commit crime?

[Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker]

The “classic” case is the “Palle Hardrup Affair” (coulda been a “Man From UNCLE” episode, but it wasn’t). The short of it, as well as I can find, is that in 1951 in Denmark, a chap by the name of Palle Hardrup committed a bank robbery, in which he killed a security guard.

He later claimed that (while serving time in jail sometime earlier) that someone had hypnotized him into doing this.

I’m very skeptical of anything that involves so-called “hypnosis,” especially in something like this. And the only sites that I found on it pretty much repeat the same info over and over. The sites cite the same stuff.

I haven’t been able to find anything else on this. Does anyone really believe (anymore) that this (crime by hypnosis) is the case?

[bibliophage]

I couldn’t find what I would consider a reliable source on the case. This site claims the hypnotist in the Palle case was convicted (of what, exactly, it doesn’t say).

Frequently the entire topic is dismissed with the notion, promoted by Martin Orne and others, that a hypnotist cannot induce a person to perform an act that this person would otherwise find objectionable. But … if the trance is deep enough, an imaginary social environment can be constructed through which an otherwise objectionable act becomes necessary and heroic…. in 1951 in Denmark, Palle Hardrup robbed a bank and killed a guard, and then claimed that hypnotist Bjorn Nielsen told him to do it. Nielsen eventually confessed that Hardrup was a test of his hypnotic techniques, which included telling Hardrup that the money from the robbery was a means to a noble end. Hardrup had become Nielsen’s robot, and Nielsen was convicted.

[Aglarond]

I’ve talked to ‘experts’ on hypnosis that use hypnosis as a therapy tool. Everybody I’ve talked to said that you couldn’t be made to do something under hypnosis that you would be morally object to normally. I’m not sure if my wording even makes sense, but hopefully you know what I’m getting at. I’m not saying it’s not possible, but it seems highly unlikely to me.

[Aglarond]

Should’ve waited before posting. I hadn’t considered the construction of an imaginary environment. I can see how that would be possible.