Multiple Personality or Malingering?

At 11:31 a.m. on Tuesday, March 13, 2012, Georgia businessman Doug Coker went to meet Pamela Moss to retrieve the $85,000 he had given her to help him start a nonprofit foundation; he had decided it was a scam and wanted his money back. His wife, Judy, was, nervous about her husband meeting Ms. Moss alone. Doug was merely irritated by the months Ms. Moss had spent ducking and dodging him. Two hours later, he was dead.

According to the prosecution, Pamela Moss lured Doug Coker to her house and beat him to death with a hammer because she had spent his money and didn’t want to go to jail. According to the defense, Ms. Moss wasn’t even there; instead, a different personality, “Caroline,” had killed Mr. Coker in self-defense. Here’s what Caroline allegedly told clinical psychologist Anthony Levitas after the murder. “I was on the floor and there was a man standing over me. He had his hand on my arm and he was holding something like what appeared to be a curtain rod. I felt threatened; I was afraid for my life. So, I hit him. I don’t know with what. The next thing I remember was him lying there and there was a lot of blood.”

Not only did the defense psychologist believe it; Pamela Moss’ history backed it up. She had been diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder in 1996, 16 years before Mr. Coker’s demise. She had received treatment for it for six years. The defense argued that Ms. Moss was not criminally responsible for Mr. Coker’s murder because Pamela, the host personality, was not there and Caroline’s mental illness…