Are Sociopaths innocents? A Philosophic, psychological question from DeathNote

[Paola Alfa]

This discussion assumes you are familiar with the storyline of DeathNote. If you aren't, please look it up in wiki if you find this thread interesting.

Light and Misa, are both sociopaths by any definition I know of, yet Misa is clearly also an innocent and Light would border on one if it were not for his ruthlessness and clear delight in killing, even in killing some innocents. Neither one is motivated by evil, not greed or gain or perversity. On the contrary, Light wants justice and Misa wants love.

They're both also victims themselves, mostly because of their great gifts. Misa rather clearly so in that she was targeted to die because of her beauty but saved and then lost her parents and Light because he is so clearly a genius, who thus thinks that the DeathNote can make him a god.

He may be right, too. By the end of the series he's reduced crime in Japan by a vast amount.

And the question occurred to me, are sociopaths, in fact, innocents? In the 19th century they were called "moral imbeciles" and there is still the implication that they simply don't understand the difference between right and wrong. They appreciate it, but on an intellectual level only, like the difference between up and down.

Are people evil if they really don't grasp what evil is?