Carina Stathis

Jonathan Brown was sitting at his desk working on a project when suddenly he stopped typing mid-sentence.

For the 55-year-old senior mechanical engineer from Sydney, the report in front of him should have been a simple enough task to complete.

But he had completely frozen and was unable to continue.

One of the worst days of Peter Hunt's life remains 'crystal clear' and 'imprinted on his brain', even though it happened 56 years ago. It was a sunny Monday afternoon and he'd just returned home from school to a hug from his mother in the front yard when two cars pulled up in the driveway. His father's friend Ian and the family doctor got out. His mother initially looked confused when she saw them then started to scream.

It's the sort of threat you see all the time from idiots on Facebook, but in my case, it's true: If you get on my bad side, I will become your worst nightmare. If you were to see me on the street you'd see a regular - even friendly - mother of five in her mid-forties. I'm also a subclinical psychopath. What does 'subclinical' mean, you ask? Rather than being 'crazy' or 'violent', like the stereotypical psycho of Hollywood movies, I instead carefully plan how I can make your life miserable through manipulation, and then I do it.

I woke to the sound of shouting. It was early Saturday morning, but the walls of our house were already shaking with my parents' voices. Curiosity tugged at me. My older sister stayed in bed while I climbed down from mine, rubbing the sleep from my seven-year-old eyes. Balancing on my tiptoes, I reached for the bedroom door handle, opened it - and froze. Mum raced past me, her face etched with fear. She bolted from their bedroom toward the spiral staircase. Dad was right behind her, a knife glinting in his hand. 'How could you betray me?' he howled.

If you saw me in the street or at the supermarket you would assume what most do - that I'm an ordinary grandmother.

But at the age 73, I am ready to share with the world a secret that I kept from my friends and family for many years. A secret that consumed every aspect of my life and eventually saw me jailed for a shocking crime.

I was a criminal but I was also a victim -...

Dressed in his private school uniform, 15-year-old student athlete Ryan Armstrong walked into his local TAB in Sydney to gamble with his lunch money.

The room was filled with middle-aged and retired men staring at television screens, placing bets on horses and sports. Being a weekday, it was quiet and the carpet smelt like it hadn't been cleaned in mo...

Arriving at her grandmother's home, five-year-old Gloria Masters breathed a sigh of relief and her tense muscles relaxed knowing she'd have a warm meal waiting inside.

For a vanishingly brief moment during her childhood, grandma's house was a safe haven for the hungry child who was neglected of love, attention and food by her father.

Belinda Stark had one hand on a full glass of sauvignon blanc and the other holding her head as she sobbed at the dining table alone. Her blue eyes were bloodshot and her nose was blocked as she tried to remain quiet while her sons slept in their bedrooms. It wasn't an especially sad occasion. Nothing catastrophic had happened. It was just another weekday night for the mother of two from Melbourne. 'I'm not good enough. I hate myself,' the voice in her head would say on repeat.