Offender Profiling

1
Offender Profiling

• Are we all Crackers?

2
Offender Profiling

• The typical profiler seen as
• quintessential hero pitted against our new and
  modern monster, the serial killer (Oleson 1996)
• Its the new, sexy specialist job in forensic
  science.
• But is its importance overrated?

3
Offender Profiling

• Historically police and psychology have not had a
  good relationship.
• Police (in particular CID) believe that only
  information that can be used easily in court is
  worth gathering.
• Psychologists have not always been recognised by
  courts
• Until recently, that is!

4
Criminal Profiling

• 1888 Thomas Bond, a police surgeon created a
  detailed description of Jack the Ripper,
• But the ripper was never apprehended.

5
Criminal Profiling

• William Langer, (1942) a psychiatrist, produced a
  profile of Adolf Hitler, diagnosing his mental
  state and correctly predicting what would happen
  were he to be defeated i.e. suicide.

6
The Mad Bomber of New York

• George Metesky
• Series of bombs in New York 1956
• James Brussel was able to produce a psychological
  profile of the suspect
• Google the name for full story
• Accurate even to style of dress!

7
The Boston Strangler

• Profiled as two male schoolteachers living
  alone, one of whom was probably homosexual
• Albert DeSalvo heterosexual construction worker
  living with his family

8
Criminal Profiling

• So, one danger in profiling possibility of
  tunnel vision of investigators.
• Yorkshire Ripper case in point

9
Offender Profiling Current Approaches

• American
• Incarcerated serial murderers (36) interviewed
• Categorised into organised or disorganised
• View crime scene for indicators

10
Offender Profiling Current Approaches - American

• Basis of FBI Approach is
• crime scene and MO as indicators of individual
  pathology
• compare with known offenders
• may fit pattern

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Offender Profiling Current Approaches - American

• Organised and disorganised murderers
• Obtained from interviews with serial murderers,
  e.g. Manson, bundy
• Based on analysis of Crime scene, say whether
  offender fits any of the criteria, and produce
  profile
• Can be used to detect, but also to predict and
  therefore prevent

12
Offender Profiling Current Approaches - American

• Aims of American profiling approach are
• Reduce scope of investigation
• Allow some prediction of future offences
• Provide a psychological evaluation of belongings
  found in the murderers possession, e.g. souvenirs
  from previous offences
• Provide strategies for interviewing.

13
Offender Profiling Current Approaches - American

• Known as holistic or top-down approach
• Data from scene and from MO compared with
  previously known information
• Mainly with murderers in USA, not so often with
  lesser crimes

14
Offender Profiling Current Approaches - British

• British approach is less subjective
• Called bottom up method, or data-driven,
• Data is collected and analysed to produce
  definite, measured, specific associations between
  offences and offender characteristics.

15
Offender Profiling Current Approaches - British

• Dominated by David Canter
• Made his name with the Railway Rapist in 1985

16
David Canter

• Traditionally, the only valuable clues at a crime
  scene were hard evidence, e.g.
• blood,
• semen
• Fingerprints
• Hair
• etc.

17
David Canter

• Profiling proposes that there are also less
  recognised clues
• the choice of victim,
• the location,
• the nature of the assault,
• what is and isn't left behind,
• what is and isn't said to the victim,
• whether or not the victim is killed
• which also define the offender. The problem is to
  interpret these clues correctly.

18
David Canter

• Over a period of four years, a series of sexual
  assaults and rapes, culminating in the murder of
  three women, had been committed in the London
  area.
• The police had linked all these crimes to the
  same man but, despite extensive inquiries, had
  failed to make an arrest.

19
David Canter

• Canter went through each case in detail, looking
  at
• the location,
• time of day,
• and the nature of the victim,
• and drew up a profile of the likely suspect,
  including where he was likely to be living.

20
David Canter

• As a result of this profile, the police were able
  to focus their investigation on John Duffy, a man
  who had previously ranked no higher than 1,505th
  on the list of possible suspects and, within a
  comparatively short period of time, had gathered
  enough evidence to convict.

21
Evaluation of Profiling

• Undoubted potential if used properly by trained
  professionals
• Some criticism is that it depends on
  over-reliance of expert profilers without the
  contribution of experienced police officers.

22
Evaluation of Profiling

• Success rates?
• 1981 FBI report
• 192 cases of profile generation, 88 arrests, of
  which 17 used the profile information.

23
Evaluation of Profiling

• Success rates?
• UK Copson Holloway interviewed detectives.
• 184 cases involving profiling
• Of these, 2.7 profiling led directly to
  identification of offender
• 16 where profiling had helped to solve

24
Useful or Not?

• Professional profilers vs detectives
• Simulated detection of two cases, one sex, one
  murder

25
Useful or Not?

• Profilers produced loads of rich information,
• More accurate than non-profilers
• Profilers best with sex offence
• Detectives best with murder

26
Useful or Not?

• Conclusion is that productive liaison between
  psychologists and police is the way forward.