Dr. Kleinman is widely regarded by fellow forensic psychiatrists and attorneys for performing incisive, in-depth evaluations, and providing deeply substantiated, thoughtful opinions.
GENERAL QUALIFICATIONS
Dr. Kleinman is a board certified psychiatrist who specializes in Forensic Psychiatry and Traumatic Stress. He treats a wide array of psychiatric conditions, consults to the civil and criminal justice system, and teaches those training in Forensic Psychiatry.
Stuart B. Kleinman, M.D. is a psychiatrist certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in Psychiatry and Forensic Psychiatry, and is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
Dr. Kleinman’s areas of expertise include:
- Traumatic Stress/ PTSD
- Psychiatric-Legal Aspects Of Employment Discrimination
- White Collar Crime
- Workplace Violence
- Criminal Responsibility/’Insanity’
- Competency: Criminal and Civil
- Violence Assessment
Dr. Kleinman additionally conducts a seminar regarding assessing emotional distress damages in civil litigation to Fellows in Forensic Psychiatry in the joint Columbia University College of Physicians – Weill Cornell School of Medicine training program in Forensic Psychiatry, and helped found the Columbia University Asylum Program.
Dr. Kleinman has served in leadership positions in the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, and the International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies. He founded the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law’s Committees on Trauma and Stress, and Victimology, and is former president of both the Tri-State Chapter of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, and the New York Chapter of the International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies.
Dr. Kleinman further possesses specialized expertise regarding the psychology of organizations, particularly the impact of violence upon individual and organizational functioning. Having evaluated both perpetrators and victims of terrorism, and consulted to companies post-the 9/11 and anthrax attacks, he possesses unique insight regarding how organizations and their employees are affected by mass trauma, and how to facilitate the functioning of both.
Dr. Kleinman has been elected both to the Phi Beta Kappa and Alpha Omega Alpha (i.e., medical) honor societies.
Expert, Credible, Methodologically Reliable Evaluation
The accuracy of any evaluation is only as reliable as the method utilized in its formulation.
Dr. Kleinman employs specific, intensive, forensically appropriate methods in reaching conclusions which are both scientifically and commonsensically valid.
Reflecting and recognizing this approach, Dr. Kleinman has helped train attorneys at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in appropriate assessment of the impact of exposure to traumatic stress.
Forensic Psychiatry
Dr. Kleinman is regularly retained by prosecutors, defense attorneys, and courts to assess competency to stand trial, criminal responsibility/’insanity’, and psychiatric disturbances potentially relevant to sentencing.
He has investigated violent behaviors ranging from mass murder to intimate family assault, and mental states ranging from psychotic and divorced from reality, to calculating and manipulative.
Dr. Kleinman has pioneered using the concept of psychological fingerprints to reliably establish the presence or absence of claimed mental states or conditions.
Traumatic Stress
Dr. Kleinman possesses a deep, nuanced appreciation of the potential psychiatric consequences of trauma.
Dr. Kleinman served as medical director of a mental health center dedicated to treating solely the psychiatric impact of trauma perpetrated upon children, and has consulted to the New York State Crime Victims Compensation Board regarding the role of criminal victimization in producing emotional distress.
Dr. Kleinman has studied, evaluated, and treated the consequences of a broad array of trauma, including Asian piracy, domestic violence, Middle Eastern terrorism, and violent urban assault. He focuses not only upon the adverse impact of such events, but also resilience and its biological, psychological, and social underpinnings.
Dr. Kleinman regularly lectures regarding proper assessment of PTSD and related conditions, and the complex role of objective, environmentally-based circumstances, and internally-based perception, both accurate and distorted, of events in producing emotional distress.
Workplace Violence
Dr. Kleinman engages collaboratively with workplace personnel to assess the risk of employees of concern acting violently, particularly identifying factors supporting and mitigating the likelihood of such, and developing creative, effective strategies of reducing this risk.
To help managers safely discipline or terminate employees, Dr. Kleinman may: 1) write guidelines for how to discuss such actions, 2) suggest how to structure meetings in which such discussions are to occur, for example, suggest the number and identity of those who should be present, and 3) develop incentives for motivating constructive employee behavior.
Dr. Kleinman’s assessments may include directly examining disturbed employees, for example, in conjunction with conducting fitness for duty assessments, or reviewing records, such as written and electronic media, in conjunction with interviewing appropriate personnel. The methodology utilized is case-specific, and includes consideration of the impact of the evaluation process upon organizational functioning.
Dr. Kleinman also collaboratively helps to avoid potentially costly litigation by designing mutually satisfactory, alternative means of redressing employee grievances.
White Collar Crime
Dr. Kleinman’s consultation to prosecutors and defense attorneys regarding the mental states of individuals awaiting sentencing for white collar criminal actions has afforded him sophisticated understanding of the psychological forces underlying such conduct. He systematically assesses the contributory role of:
- Personality factors, such as hedonism, entitlement, and prestige-seeking;
- Interpersonal dynamics, such as love, hate, desire for vengeance;
- Biological pathology, e.g., ‘brain damage’, in impairing judgment and behavioral control, and potentially contributing to uncharacteristic behavior; and
- Impulsivity, distinguishing between non-pathological, personality-based impulsive actions, and impulsivity arising from an impulse-impairing mental disorder.
Threat Assessment
Dr. Kleinman has studied those who threaten to harm, stalk, or attempt to extort funds. He is expert at developing response strategies, including assessing the risk/reward ratio of potential responses, and identifying the psychological factors motivating threatening behavior. Common motivations include:
- Paranoid desire to avenge perceived malice.
- Pathological narcissism, and desire to diminish those by whom the individual feels slighted, i.e., ‘dissed’.
- Borderline personality-based inability to tolerate actual or perceived rejection, and wish to punish the rejecting party.
- Delusional, nonreality-based fear or anger-inducing beliefs, e.g., that one’s safety is acutely endangered, or that a jealous individual is hostilely preventing a secretly enamored third party from uniting with the potential assailant.
- Psychopathic desire for money, and/or to inflict pain.
EMail: DrStuartKleinman@stuartbkleinmanmd.com
or call: +1 917 441 7500