The 22 levels of evil according to Michael Stone's scale

March 21, 2024

Michael Stone is a doctor specializing in forensic psychiatry at Columbia University who has spent most of his life studying and analyzing in detail behaviors of all types of murderers. Thanks to all that research, he was able to elaborate the scale of evil.

Most Evil: elaborating a scale of evil

Stone directed the program Most Evil (in Spain, Profile of a psychopath) In the channel Discovery Max, where he exposes the classification he calls "scale of evil". In the different chapters of the program the life and crimes of several murderers are shown, on which an investigation is carried out and each case is explained in detail, taking into account all the factors that may have influenced, predispose and explain why their behavior , to be able to classify it later on that scale.

A tool to assess the degree of psychopathy

The scale of evil It was created meticulously attending to many types of factors: environmental, neurological and genetic. The objective was to break down each case into small units, as if they were molecules, in order to have the greatest possible precision and determine the reason why a person could commit something as atrocious as murder.

In the scale of the badness questions are posed that help the professional to know the particularities of each case. For example, explore whether the subject had a traumatic childhood, their motives for committing murders, why they have preferences for some victims or others ... A key point in this scale of evil is, worth the redundancy, the evil and the sadism itself expressed in the crime, that is, the meditation on it, the method of death that was used, etc. Therefore, judgments of value, morality, ethics and others are used to classify subjects at a specific point within this scale.

Analyzing the murderer's mind and brain

In addition, Stone it allows us to go deep into the murderer's mind , examining how the brains of people who commit crimes of blood work, as well as their feelings towards the victim based on the degree of evil in which they find themselves based on their scale of evil.

Sometimes the information is complemented with brain scan tests, making the person visualize different photographs and emotionally unpleasant words, or else, that is, images that evoke positive feelings such as love.

The 22 levels of evil

The scale in question it is a hierarchy that ascends progressively from level 1 to 22 , being minimal or no malice (level 1) to maximum (level 22).

After this introduction, we will know the model of the scale and its different levels.

Level 1 : they killed exclusively in self-defense, they do not show any kind of psychopathic tendency.

Level 2 : passion crimes committed by jealous lovers. They can be immature and / or egocentric but they are not psychopathic.

Level 3 : partners, partners or enthusiastic lovers of dangerous homicides. They have impulsive and aberrant personality with antisocial features.

Level 4 : They kill in self-defense, but they caused a great deal of aggression to happen to them.

Level 5 : psychologically traumatized individuals who are desperate and murder relatives who sexually abused them. They can include drug addicts that the reason for their murder is to get money or drugs, but do not have significant psychopathic characteristics. They have some remorse for the acts committed.

Level 6 : act impulsively, "hot". They do not have marked psychopathic characteristics.

Level 7 : highly narcissistic individuals, not distinguishable from people with some type of psychotic disorder, kill people around them mainly out of jealousy or passion.

Level 8 : people not psychopaths but with high levels of repressed fury, they come to kill when an event triggers or ignites them.

Level 9 : zealous jealous lovers with psychopathic characteristics.

Level 10 : murderers who killed people who stood in their way or witnesses who could give him away. They have egocentric but not psychopathic personality clearly distinguishable.

Level 11 : the same as level ten but this time with a remarkable psychopathic personality.

Level 12 : psychopaths eager for power that they killed when they felt cornered.

Level 13 : psychopaths full of fury, which lost control of it.

Level 14 : ruthlessly self-centered psychopathic conspirators, want to get a benefit from someone.

Level 15 : psychopaths multihomicidas that in a day of outburst of fury (spree killing) kill so many people crossing in front of you in cold blood.

Level 16 : psychopaths who commit several or multiple criminal acts, do not settle for murdering once and may include vicious acts.

Level 17 : sexually perverse serial murderers and torturers-murderers, although their main purpose is the violation because the subsequent homicide is for the purpose of not reporting the victim.

Level 18 : murderers who usually torture their victims beforehand, although their main motivation is murder.

Level 19 : Psychopaths inclined towards terrorism, subjugation, rape and intimidation.

Level 20 : torturers and psychotic killers in whom torture is the main motivation.

Level 21 : psychopaths who are extremely interested in torture, but who do not know for sure if they have committed homicides.

Level 22 : extreme torturers and psychopathic murderers, which torture is the main motivation. Their crimes involve prolonged sexual torture, followed by the murder of their victims.

Profile of a psychopath

Finally, here we provide the link to several chapters of the program "Profile of a psychopath", so you can see how different distinguished murderers are classified in the scale of evil. You can also watch the program currently on television on the channel Discovery Max .