ABSTRACT
Alan A. Stone, M.D., wrote that, ‘No diagnosis in the history of American psychiatry has had a more dramatic and pervasive impact on law and social justice than posttraumatic stress disorder … ’ (Stone 1993). His thoughts are particularly poignant as we survey the changing landscape of child and adolescent forensic psychiatry. The practitioner must be attuned to the strengths and limitations of his or her own qualifications, ethical obligations, and the current research and controversies that uniquely define the field. Cook (1996) summarizes the issues thus: ‘as new visitors (to the legal system), they must be alerted to old tricks familiar to adult forensic psychiatrists. The art and science of forensic psychiatry is both slowly evolving and rapidly changing. The practitioner must not only be clinically competent, but be wary of the multiple agendas of society, the law, and adversarial lawyers.’
