TARGET PERSONS

How emotional predators choose their targets—and how survivors can rebuild a meaningful life.
Psychopaths rarely choose their victims by chance. They identify emotional needs and vulnerabilities, gain trust, isolate their targets and gradually replace love, friendship and family bonds with manipulation, coercion and psychological control.
By the time victims recognize what is happening, they have often lost their confidence, autonomy and sense of self.
Drawing on more than thirty years of research and hundreds of real-life cases, renowned criminologist Vicente Garrido introduces the concept of the Target Person: the individual deliberately chosen by an emotional predator. Garrido argues that we are living in the age of psychopathy—a time in which
psychopathic traits are increasingly rewarded and normalized,making psychological abuse one of the defining challenges of contemporary society.
Target Persons is far more than a book about psychopathy.
Shifting the focus from the predator to the survivor, Garrido presents a comprehensive model that explains not only how psychological abuse unfolds, but also how recovery becomes possible. Through five stages—from seduction
and domination to revelation, liberation and post-traumatic growth—he combines criminology, psychology, philosophy and practical guidance into a roadmap for reclaiming identity after emotional abuse.
At the heart of the book lies the metaphor of "expanding the eye of the hurricane": the conviction that the only lasting response to the growing culture of psychopathy is to create an ever-wider space where empathy, moral courage and human connection can thrive.