Criminal Profiling Flashcards
Criminal Profiling
An educated attempt to provide specific information about a certain type of suspect
A biographical sketch of personality characteristics, behavioural patterns, trends, and tendencies
Premise: the way a person thinks directs behaviour
Purpose of Profiling
Suspect prioritization
New lines of inquiry
Flush out offender
Develop interview/interrogation strategies
Offer cross-examination strategies to prosecution
Evaluate threats
Why do we need profilers ?
Assist with quicker apprehension
Motives difficult to pinpoint
What do profilers aim to predict
Age Sex Race Intelligence Education Hobbies Family background Location Criminal history Employment status/history
Profiling particular perpetrator
Modus Operandi: Standard procedure Learned behaviour that is modified Signature: Unique, personal aspects of the crime Fulfills emotional needs
Steps generating a criminal profile
Study nature of crime and types of people who committed similar offenses in the past
Detailed analysis of crime scene
Examine background and activities of victim(s)
Develop possible motivations of everyone
Develop perp description
Danger of profiling
Spousal murder profiling
Can provide a way for stereotypes to guide an investigation
Approaches to criminal profiling
Deductive profiling:
Profiling an offender from evidence relating to that offender’s crimes
Inductive profiling:
Profiling an offender from what is known about other offenders who have committed similar (solved) crimes
Deductive Method of Criminal profiling
Involves interpreting forensic evidence, including
crime scene photographs:
autopsy reports
autopsy photos
victimology
to reconstruct specific offender crime scene behaviour patterns
From those specific, individual patterns of behaviour, deduce offender characteristics, demographics, emotions, and motivations
Assumptions
No offender acts without motivation
Every offense should be investigated as its own unique behavioural and motivational existence
Given the nature of human behaviour, no two cases are really ever alike
Some offenders have unique motivations and/or behaviours that should be individuated from other similar offenders
All human behaviour develops uniquely, over time, in response to environmental and biological factors
Criminal MO behaviour can evolve over time and over the commission of multiple offenses
A single offender is capable of multiple motives over the commission of multiple offenses, or even during the commission of a single offense
Statistical generalizations and experiential theorizing, although helpful, are incomplete
Pros and Cons of Deductive Method
Advantages:
Produces more specific profiles
Focus on motivations
Built on case evidence rather than hypothesis
Examines behaviours of individual offenders as they occur over time
Disadvantages:
Requires specialized education and training in forensic science, crime scene reconstruction, and wound pattern analysis
Great effort and multi-disciplinary collaboration
Potentially emotionally exhausting
–Get ‘inside’ offenders head
Cannot identify a specific known individual unless that offender’s unique signature is known and established
Inductive Method of Criminal Profiling
Reasoning from initial data to specific criminal offender behaviour
The profile is the result of either:
–statistical analysis
–reasoning in cases outside of the case at hand
Assumptions of Inductive Method
Assumptions
Small groups of known offenders, who commit the same types of crimes as unknown offenders, have commonly shared individual characteristics that can be generalized back to similar individual unknown offenders.
Offenders who have committed crimes in the past are culturally similar to current offenders, being influenced by similar environmental conditions and existing with the same general and sometimes specific motivations.
Individual human behaviour and characteristics can be generalized and predicted from the initial statistical analysis of characteristics and behaviour in very small samples
Behaviour and motivation do not change within an individual over time, being static, predictable characteristics
Pros and Cons of the Inductive Method
Advantages:
Very easy tool to use
–No specialized forensic knowledge, education, or training in the study of criminal behaviour or criminal investigation required
General profiles assembled relatively quickly
- -Result is often a one or two page list of unqualified characteristics
- -Generalizations can accurately predict some non-distinguishing elements of individual criminal behaviour (but not with a great deal of consistency or reliability)
Disadvantages:
Information generalized from limited samples - not related to any one case
–Not by its nature intended for reconstructing a “profile” of an individual person
–Sample may not be representative
Does not fully or accurately take into account current offenders at large
–Excludes criminals who are successful in avoiding detection by law enforcement
May contain inaccuracies that implicate innocent individuals
Organized-Disorganized Model
Crime scenes categorized as:
organized (methodical)
disorganized (chaotic)
Background characteristics categorized as:
organized (high functioning)
disorganized (low functioning)
Organized crimes assumed to have been committed by organized offenders; disorganized crimes by disorganized offenders
Organized
Murders are planned, target victims, show self-control, may act out violent fantasy
Ted Bundy – ruse of broken arm
Disorganized
Less planful, gets victims by chance, haphazard behaviour during crime
Problem of OD Model
Little research on the model
Extant research raises serious doubts about validity
Cannot account for offenders who display a mix of O-D features
-May be the majority of offenders
