For my Homicide class we had to read this book Profiles in Murder by Russell Vorpagel. I actually found the book to be really good. It is about a real life profiler for the FBI Behavior Science Unit and actually put the unit on the map and made a good name for it. He talks about real cases that he was involved in and what profiling did within those cases. In the book he is a professor teaching others to become profilers and who are generally interested in what it does for cases. He explains that if a profile is wrong it can through off the entire case and they could be searching for the completely wrong suspect. He goes on explaining that if you see a crime scene and it looks like an accident that being an investigator that every possiblility needs to be looked before murder or suicide can be ruled out.
This book was very good and if anyone is interested in learning about real and strange cases and how profiling was used then this would be a great book to read and it is a very quick read!
I also read this book and was very intrigued by it. Profiling is actually how I originally became interested in Psychology. This book is not only easy to read, but it keeps the reader involved in what is actually going on. There were times when I was reading it that it was like I was actually there going through the process of profiling. Profiling is very important to a case and as you said can make or break the case. It is important to know what kind of person you are looking for and using the physical clues to describe the suspect without him/her being there can be the best tool to breaking a case. I also like that the cases talked about in the book were not simply made up, but he was basing the information off real cases.
A very interesting show to watch on profiling is "Criminal Minds". This is where an FBI team is brought in on cases to profile for local law when they have come to a dead end. It reflects the steps it takes to profile. Even though this is strictly a TV show and now based on real life many of the cases they use reflect cases that have actually happened. This is my favorite crime show on TV because it focuses on the psychological part of a crime and not just on evidence. Profiling is a very important part of the process it takes to break a case, but I do not think it is expressed as such.