Reading Blog Due 2/22 10pm

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For this week, read Ch 5 in C&K on profling

Summarize the chapter. Did you learn anything surprising? Were any of your own ideas about profiling debunked by reading this chapter? What is something you want to learn more about? Search on that topic and report on some additional information about that topic. Provide any links to resources.

Your posts should be getting progressively longer and more detailed. You should clearly link psychology to the legal context under evaluation.

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Chapter 5 in the C&K book begins by talking about Silence of the Lambs and how its main story line is about an FBI agent who uses profiling to find a serial killer. However, the movie is misleading because profiling is not always a successful tool to use when trying to catch serial killers because it “is neither systematic nor clearly articulated”. Profiling is the process of making inferences about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. Profilers emphasize the “signature aspect of a crime” which means the distinct and personal aspects of the specific crime that presumably reveal the personality of the killer. Psychology can be very useful for this type of investigation. From the crime scene and evidence psychologists can connect motivation to the crime. Such as what starts and stops this criminal’s behavior, what goal are they working to achieve, and what are their rewards from such a crime? What personality characteristics are likely to accompany this type of killer? Profiling relies on psychology to describe the personality and the personal characteristics of the killer. Was the killing emotional? Is there any stress involved with the killings? Also, how intelligent is the killer? Do they plan things out or act spur of the moment? All of these questions are addressed when profiling and all of them deal with psychology.
However, Chapter 5 discusses how profiling can lead police on wild goose chases and lead to tunnel vision. The mad bomber case during the 1950’s used a profiler who, based on letters that the bomber had written to police, created a profile for the criminal. The profile turned out to be mostly correct about the bomber, even down to what he would be wearing. However, even the profiler himself said that he wasn’t sure how reliable his profile would be. He questioned whether he would be leading police down the wrong path, which is a major problem with profiling. Studies have attempted to test how reliable profiling can be and many have found that it is not a very useful task in finding the criminal. One study done about rapists found that there was no correlation at all between the characteristics of 100 actual rapists. This suggests that if there is no correlation for criminals who commit similar crimes, there is probably no link to personality characteristics and specific crimes. Problems with profiling are that it relies on judgments and inferences made by the profiler, which are probably not consistent. Also, criminals are not always as consistent as we would like to think that they are. For example, even serial killers can kill differently based on their situation and their victim. Changing the situation, like the setting being crowded or secluded or the emotional state of the perpetrator, can affect how the crime is carried out and ultimately how the crime scene is. This make case linkage hard because even serial killers can produce vastly different crime scenes given the situation, which would lead police to assume that the two cases were unrelated, or vice versa. The chapter also talks about geographic profiling which relies on maps and mathematics to find key locations that are associated with serial crimes. They use computer technology to plot the activities of the crime on a map. The programs can look for an anchor point from where attacks might be launched.
I thought the topic of psychological autopsies for equivocal deaths was interesting. This is used to determine the psychological state of a person prior to his or her death, in which the cause is unknown. Psychology is definitely used here. Psychologists can help asses a person’s psychological state after their death by interviewing close friends and family members about the emotional state, personality, and lifestyle of the deceased. This used of psychology can help to decide whether a death was a murder, accidental or suicidal, which is very important for criminal cases. Based on the answers of those close to the victim, psychologists/profilers can evaluated that person’s mental health which would ultimately affect if that person was murdered or committed suicide. I did some more research on this topic and found that “Psychological autopsies have confirmed that the vast majority of suicide victims could be diagnosed as having had a mental disorder, usually depression, manic depression, or alcohol or drug problems.” This means that by knowing if a victim had any of these diseases we could better understand the crime and potentially determine the cause of death. http://www.deathreference.com/A-Bi/Autopsy-Psychological.html This article discusses the ways in which psychological autopsies can help us determine risk factors for suicide, which is beneficial for working to prevent suicides. I read about a study on a very intelligent young man who committed suicide. The psychological autopsy covered his entire 21 years of life. His results from this autopsy were compared with suicide statistics. This can provide helpful information about what personality characteristics, age, gender, and other factors can be related to suicide. http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10337.aspx
From this chapter my ideas about profiling have definitely changed. My views prior to the reading were that, like in the movie silence of the lambs, profiling was a more concrete and helpful tool in crimes. I thought that profiling was widely used and much more successful than it really is. I was surprised to learn that we really don’t have a good estimate of how often profiles have been useful or useless. It was surprising to learn that profiling can just as easily and dangerously lead detectives in the wrong direction. This chapter definitely made me realize just how hard and problematic profiling can be.

Chapter 5 deals with criminal profiling and psychological autopsies. Criminal profiling is analyzing the crime scene and other evidence to determine the criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics.
Made famous by the movie Silence of the Lambs, criminal profiling has been around for quite some time. Some might consider Dr. Thomas Bond's analysis of Jack the Ripper as one of the first profiles ever developed. However, most accredit Dr. James Brussel with that accomplishment for the profile he developed on the Mad Bomber in the 1950s.
The FBI's Behavioral Science Unit (BSU) has led the way in using criminal profiling but currently there are only about a dozen agents who specialize in it. The most famous profiler would have to be Special Agent John Douglas. Douglas has written several books which take readers through his actual case files and how he developed the profiles that led police to determine a suspect.
The BSU uses criminal profiling mostly for cases involving serial killers. The start off their investigation by determining the killer's signature. The signature is an aspect of the crime that is carried out for no other purpose than to give the killer some sort of sexual gratification (such as torturing a victim). This is not to be confused with the killer's modus operandi or MO. The MO is the method or methods the killer used to complete his crime. MOs are things like using a special tool to jimmy a locked door or giving a potential victim a laced drink to subdue her so that he can commit his crime. The key thing to remember about the MO is that it is the bare minimum essentials needed to carry out a crime. This differs from the signature because the signature is something that the killer does that doesn't facilitate to the murder. Using the examples I listed above, drugging a potential victim so that a killer can transport her to another location is considered an MO. This is because the act of drugging the victim was essential to getting the victim else where so that the crime could be committed. Now if after the arrival to the killer's location, he binds the victim up and repeatedly slashes or cuts part of the victim while she is conscious, this is considered a signature. The killer does not need to perform these acts to kill the victim, rather he is committing him for his own malicious and perverted reasons. It is upon closer examination of the signature that a profiler can determine a lot about a perpetrator.
What I found truly surprising about the chapter is the research (what little research there is) conducted that calls in to question the accuracy and validity of the practice of criminal profiling. I had realized previously that profiling was not going to led directly to capturing a perpetrator but I figured that it would at least determine whether you had the right suspect or not. What I didn't realize was that there was no correlation between the crimes committed and the perpetrators that committed them.
Geographic profiling is something that I have a little experience with (at least when it comes to operating the geographic program)from a class I took at Hawkeye. With geographic profiling, a computer program can analyze the data of where the crimes were committed, dump sites, etc to try to narrow down the general vicinity of where a perpetrator may live or work. The main problem with this method is that it only works if there has been numerous crimes committed by the same person.
Although the chapter briefly discussed a new and upcoming practice called behavioral investigative advice (BIA), I decided to research on the topic further. BIA helps investigators by aiding (1) suspect prioritization, (2) linking crimes and crime scenes, (3) geographical profiling,(4) the interviewing process, and (5) risk assessment of offenders in clinical settings. In traditional offender profiling, there are three different approaches used: criminal investigative approach, clinical practitioner approach, and scientific statistical approach. All though all three approaches have positives and negatives to their use, BIA attempts to combine the apparent advantages of all three to develop information that would be useful to the investigators in their cases.
To find out more information on BIA there is a very interesting research article that I found through the Google Scholar search on the Rod Library website. It's about 18 pages long but it compares the traditional profiling techniques to the BIA program. The article was called "Pragmatic solutions to offender profiling and behavioural investigative advice" by Laurence Alison, Alasdair Goodwill, Louise Almond,Claudia van den Heuvel and Jan Winter. This is the link to the web page of the article but I'm not sure if it will work (if not just copy the information above and use Rod Library's Google Scholar to find it): http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~jwinter/Alisonetal.10.pdf

I was very interested in criminal profiling when I was in high school. I spent most of my time researching exactly what they do in my free time at school. I even wrote a few papers on criminal profilers and what it takes to become one.
Psychology of personality is definitely an area of psychology which is used in criminal profiling. The whole profile is based off of the criminal’s individual profile. Social psychology, knowing what certain people act like and how they feel makes a great profiler. People hold certain characteristics which can lead to certain personalities.
Signatures are fascinating, a special and significant aspect of serial crimes; the criminal is leaving a mark on each victim, owning their crime, and leaving their personality on the scene. Serial killers can be visionary, mission-oriented, hedonistic, and/or power-oriented type. These are some types which describe serial killers and their reasoning. One of the only crime shows I actually watch is Dexter; a show based off of a mission-oriented serial killer. In some twisted way, I find it comforting to learn about serial killers. Maybe it is because I am a very “left-brain thinker” and love organization and routines. Maybe it’s because I am secretly learning how to perform; only kidding. In the end I think that serial killer cases are very interesting to me.
One case the book mentions was the case of Jack the Ripper. Even though the profile for the Jack the Ripper case was compelling, he was never caught. I did not know the Jack the Ripper case was the first profile used to help in an investigation.
By looking at past bombing events, the police were able to profile of who they thought would be the Olympic bomber. Politics played a large role in this investigation; the police assured the public that they had caught the bomber and they were all safe. A few months after the Olympics, the police came out with another report; they claimed they were wrong and had no evidence on the first man convicted.
Mad Bomber placed bombs, undetonated, with a note as a warning to major New York establishments; showing his own form of patriotism. The profile created for this man was fairly accurate. Police created a profile based off of letters the bomber had sent to the police.
The profilers are not always very confident in their profiles. They sometimes worry that they will be misleading the police. Profilers should be confident but conscious in their descriptions and profiles created. The police and investigative department should also be conscious and careful when trying to identify the culprit. The profile should be taken seriously, but there must be room for error.
Psychological autopsies are done when there has been an ambiguous death or an uncertainty to why some event occurred. A psychological autopsy tries to get at the state of mind a person was in before their death. To do this, investigators look back at the persons archive; looking at anything to do with the deceased’s death and their state of mind. Medical examiners can explain the physical attributes of a death while a psychological autopsy can explain the non-physical attributes. I think I would like to know a little more about psychological autopsies.
Because death is the ultimate secret keeper, a psychological autopsy can help shed some light on what the person may have been thinking. They attain information from family and friends, medical records, and questioning the medical examiners of the deceased. The biographical information such as age, marital status, occupation can be attained through family members and friends. Some personal information such as relationships, lifestyle, alcohol/drug use, sources of stress can also be retrieved from family and friends. The secondary information such as family history, police records, and diaries can be attained through the professionals in his/her life and also through family and friends. It’s hard to determine if the psychological autopsies are valid or not. There are no set guidelines to go off of for determining the case. There is no empirical or hard evidence which can be used to determine the cause of death.
http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com/psychological-autopsy.html
http://ezinearticles.com/?Understanding-The-Psychological-Autopsy&id=202888

The chapter starts off with the process of profiling: what profilers consider when putting together their profiles, who they usually profile, and how they work with law enforcement. One of the things I found surprising was that there are only about a dozen FBI agents who specialize in profiling. I thought it would have been a more widespread profession, but I guess I probably thought that because professions like profiling are so popular in movies and tv shows right now. Next, three famous profiles are descibed in depth: Jack the Ripper, the Olympic Bomber, and the Mad Bomber. I found it surprising how accurate some of the information was in these profiles. However, they may only pay attention to the accurate information and sort of push aside the inaccurate descriptions, which is pointed out later in the chapter. Then characteristics of serial killers were described, and they are split up into different categories such as: organized crime scene, disorganized crime scene, organized murderers, and disorganized murderers. It was also described how serial killers can be put into another type of four categories: visionary types, mission-oriented types, Hedonistic types, and power-oriented types. I thought this information was kind of surprising. I didn't know that there were different classifications for serial killers, even though after reading it, it makes sense. I think it would be hard to classify serial killers into these different categories. I'm aware that they probably overlap, but for example how can someone possibly tell the difference between visionary types and mission-oriented types? Research on profiling was discussed next. I found it surprising that only 27% of published articles on profiling described actual research studies, and only 5% of those studies focused on theoretical issues. I had no idea about this information; I thought profiling was like any other behavioral science where they learn a lot of what they know through peer-reviewed research studies. I guess this was another myth I believed, along with the actual numbers of FBI profilers. If research and a peer-review process isn't really happening in this discipline, then I don't understand how law enforcement can seriously utilize the information given to them by profilers. It was also mentioned in the chapter that basically profiling was highly subjective. Different profilers working on the same case could give very different, conflicting profiles. It was also descibed how some information given in a profile is completely useless to investigators for example, "Women who have had sex with this guy would describe him as aloof and uninvolved." Another negative aspect of profiling that was described in the chapter was how profiles can cause law enforcement to have "tunnel vision" when looking for the suspect, and completely overlook anyone who doesn't fit the description in the profile even if they may be the guy. I had no idea about any of this information, and now that I do, it seems like criminal profiling has a lot more negative aspects to it, than it does positive. The profession itself is highly subjective, there is not much research going on within the field, and it can cause the actual criminals to be overlooked because they may not fit perfectly into the profile.Geographic profiling is mentioned next, which is described as a little less intuitive, but still having its problems. Finally, psychological autopsies are mentioned. Pretty much everything I thought I knew about profiling, which wasn't much to begin with, turned out to be a myth, as I mentioned earlier. However, this entire chapter was surprising to me because it contained information that was all new to me. After reading this chapter I think it would be interesting to learn more about the treatment of psychopaths since it was mentioned that one of the myths regarding psychopaths was that they were untreatable. However, when I was looking up this information I didn't find anything about how they may be successfully treated. Everything I found explains how most of these people do not seek out treatment, but participate in psychotherapy once they are imprisoned. The National Institute of Health believes that the most promising treatment are ones that show the person the negative consequences of illegal behavior. They also acknowledge that the effectiveness of treatment for these people is unknown. Other experts believe that these people "are an unfortunate fusion of interpersonal, biological, and sociocultural disasters."
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000921.htm#Treatment
http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/notorious/tick/psych_6.html

Chapter 5 in our textbook starts off by going through three major serial killer profiles, Jack the Ripper, The Olympic Bomber and the Mad Bomber which we read about in Minds on Trial. The next part of the chapter goes into detail about some of the characteristics of a serial killer. They say that they are mostly white males of average intelligence who seek dominance from their victims. Two types of crime scenes left by criminals were described in this sections which included organized and disorganized. They linked certain characteristics to one of the two times of crime scenes. For an organized crime scene it was thought that the perpetrator was of average intelligence, sexually competent, possessed interpersonal skills and has high geographic mobility. However, unorganized murderers were thought to be of below average intelligence, had poor work skills, were sexually incompetent and had harsh discipline as a child.
Some of the aspects of profiling that were corrected or debunked by this reading were that profiling is a lot harder than I had originally thought. I’m sure that the media had a large role in what I thought a profiler could do with the information they were given by police, but it is much harder to draw conclusions about a person by what is left behind at a crime scene. Another thing I thought was interesting was how profilers were not as accurate as I had anticipated. In a research study it found that profilers were better at coming up with a profile but found them to be wrong about 50% of the time.
As for helping the police find a suspect this chapter shed light on the fact that a profile can actually hurt an investigation by leading detectives in the wrong direction or arresting the wrong person, even though they fit the description. Because profilers make inferences about a suspect they tend to make them kind of broad so they tend to include a lot of other people. I think that some of the examples of characteristics that were determined in a profile could include half the population. So after reading this chapter I agreed with the view of other on profiling that it can be useful in some situations but for the most part they don’t really pay off in the long run so they are better off without them.
One thing that I wanted to learn more about was the stereotyped profile of a serial killer being white men of average intelligence and between 20 and 30 years old. I understand that these profile are based on statistics and records of criminals who have already committed these crimes, but I wanted to do some more research to look into the other cases where serial killers where something other than white males. I looked up some information on female serial killers and found a website with a list of the top ten women serial killers. I looked over some of the women who were featured and felt that some of their crimes were worse than some of the male killers. But I worse in a way that they killed more for emotion and what they mentally stand to gain for their murders than in the case for men where they kill in a more gruesome manor and often for physical gratification. One of the women on this list was Amelia Dyer who was a ‘baby farmer’. She apparently would take in children from mothers who could not support them or it couldn’t be known that they had a baby for a fee. She would then take the babies and the money from the mother and then murder the babies. This is why I think some of the crimes females commit could almost be seen as worse than males because they seem to be more for mental reward than for physical reward or please.
http://www.ranker.com/list/famous-female-serial-killers/reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/index.html?curid=11443817

Profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. The first known case where profiling was used was in the case of Jack the Ripper. Dr. Thomas Bond was the man who was performing the autopsies on the body and deducted that the killer was strong, cool, daring, decent looking, middle-aged, and probably wore a cloak/overcoat. Unfortunately Jack the Ripper was not captured so there is no way to determine whether or not he was correct. Another famous case where profiling was used was in the case of the Olympic Bomber. A bomb was set off during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. The police had settled on Richard Jewell, a security guard for the Olympics, because he had fit the description. The FBI was incorrect, though, and Jewell's reputation could never be fully salvaged. And finally, in the case of the Mad Bomber, a profile of the perpetrator was made. The man who had made this profile was exactly spot on, to the outfit he would be wearing. But he was not caught because of the description, but rather a mistake he had made in writing a letter. The work of the police in the follow up of this mistake is what finally caught the Mad Bomber. Serial killers tend to follow a certain pattern in their characteristics as well. Some of these are: suffer from a brain injury that impairs rational thinking, experienced some sort of abuse during childhood, white males of average intelligence, and most do not usually use guns as weapons but rather something more personal such as strangulation or a knife.

Some problems with profiling are that there may be incorrect assumptions. For example, a certain crime scene does not necessarily fit a certain profile for the perpetrator. Also there is no way to tell how a profiler’s inference process works. There is also some problems in cross-situational consistency. This means that a situation may vary across crimes committed and this may cause differences among crime scenes committed y the same person. Another problem is that some speculations made about the perpetrator may be of little use to the investigators. For example, some pieces of the description of the BTK killer were that he was heavily into masturbation, is a lone wolf, and he's crazy like a fox. How does an investigator use this to catch a person? Some inconsistencies among the some profile were that he was lower-middle class and it was later said that he was middles class. Another one was that he might be married but probably divorced (complete opposites) and that his IQ ranged from 105 to 145 (a very large range). Lastly, profiling might cause an investigator to start having tunnel vision. If the profile says that the perpetrator is most likely African American in his mid-30s, an investigator might ignore the forty year old Caucasian who may have committed the crime.

Psychological autopsies are very helpful in describing the cause of death and why the death may have occurred in the first place. In classifying the death, the NASH system (natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide) is used most often. An example in the book was that of a man driving off a large cliff and falling to his death. Did he do it purposely or did he accidentally fall asleep while driving? Or maybe somebody cut his brakes in hoping that something like this would happen. People who perform these autopsies are there to discover exactly what was going on before the death had occurred.

What really surprised me about profiling was how "useless" it can really be. There is no 100% guarantee that what the profiler is saying is correct and even if they are, how many single white men in their thirties do you know? I see how it could be useful in some cases, but I feel as though the police doing the investigative work are who really catching the perpetrator. And I have never really thought all that much about the profiling of crimes, but reading this chapter has really made this process seem almost unimportant and sort of a waste of resources.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offender_profiling
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-criminal-profiling.htm

This chapter is about profiling, its history, its effectiveness, the steps involved in it and some of the famous cases in which profiling has made a significant impact, problems with profiling. This chapter is also has some information about psychological autopsies which I found very interesting.
Profiling is basically the effort to come up with a profile of the perpetrator and the reasons as to the crime were committed by him/her through the information at the crime scene, the way the used by the criminal to commit the offence, common sense and past research. The technique of profiling is mostly used in the serial killings and there is also information about the various signature one the particular distinctive aspect a criminal that is very significant to the profilers it is basically a significant tool for the profilers to make certain conclusions regarding the criminals frame of mind and the motivations behind his actions ie money or other reasons.
The cases in which profiling has been a great help were very interesting to read about especially in the case of the mad bomber as it was shocking to read that the profiler could make such accurate inferences about the criminal and his life. The fact which I thought was most interesting in this chapter was that it is not only considered important to understand the criminals motives etc but it is equally important to understand and gain as much information about the victim such as the condition and the mental state of the victim, the victims last actions all these aspects help to determine the method of committing the killing and the possible motive of the criminal and whether or not the criminal and victim know each other which might point towards the possible cause for example a forced entry points more towards the fact that the crime might be committed by a stranger but when there is no sign of forced entry there is a possibility that the victim might be familiar with the criminal .
Another thing which I found extremely interesting was the Geographic profiling i.e. how the locations can be a key feature in the process of gathering more information about the criminal. Geographic profiling basically uses the crime scene location i.e. where the crime occurred, the location where the victim’s body was found etc all this information is then combined and then used to statistically determine the possible location where the victim might be found and where he/she may attack another one of his victims.
I think I would like to learn more about the geographic profiling as it seems to be more accurate and interesting and also in my opinion if a criminal has a particular zone where he/she generally commits these offences geographic profiling can help in avoiding further killings through this process especially in the case of serial killers. Profiling can be very accurate but it is not scientific as mostly it is drawing information through common sense. It has been made popular through TV shows as well but in reality the profilers need to try much harder to come up with profiles and they don’t always get a correct profile the first time,so profiling is not exactly scientific and might not always be 100% accurate.
This is a link about profiling explaining the two ways of profiling as well namely inductive and deductive:
http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/00206/nts_psychological_profiling.htm

In the book Forensic and Legal Psychology chapter 5 is about criminal profiling and psychological autopsies. It starts off the chapter discussing the movie The Silence of the Lambs because it was one of the first times the public was introduced to criminal profiling. The movie is about a FBI agent who is following a case of a serial killer and is trying to develop a profile of them. In the end she is dead on about the profile of the serial killer, but it is also a movie so criminal profiling is not that easy.
The main definition of profiling is- the process of drawing inferences about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on the crime scene and other evidence. Criminal profiling originated from the FBI’s behavior science unit. These profiling techniques are also used in other countries as well. There are only about a dozen FBI agents that specialize in profiling because it takes a long time to get that high up in the FBI and not that many profilers are needed. Profiling is most commonly used for cases such as serial murders, and is not used for really common crimes and crimes that happen only once. Profiling is ultimately about good judgment and your own knowledge. You have to get in the mind of the killer while viewing the crime scene and thinking about how the crime occurred. All of that is based off your own judgment from what you can tell occurred during the crime. There are three famous profiles of people noted in the book. The first person is Jack the Ripper. Jack the Ripper was a serial killer and also was considered to have the first criminal profile developed. Jack the Ripper was never caught so the profile may have not been so accurate but it was still considered to be the first profile developed to help the police in a criminal investigation. The second famous profiler was The Olympic Bomber where many crimes occurred at the 1996 Olympics including rape, arson, and bombing. The FBI came up with a profile of who they thought was doing it for the police to search for. After a few days of developing a profile the police came up with someone they thought had done it, a security guard at the Olympics. The name and picture of the guard appeared all over the country in the news; they thought they had caught the bomber all from just a profile that was developed. Three months after the Olympics ended, the FBI admitted they had no evidence linking this man to the bombings and he had not done it. In 1998 they then did more investigation which led them to captured and convict a new man that had actually done the bombings and crimes. The security guard though was wrongly convicted, his name and picture had been spread all over the country, and now his life was basically ruined by the FBI lacking in evidence saying he had done a crime that he had not committed. The third person listed is known as “The mad bomber”. He had been leaving bombs near a company called Consolidated Edison Company with notes attached. For 16 years he did this while police tried to figure out whom it was doing this. They hired a psychiatrist to develop a profile of who the person might be. Eventually after the profile was leaked to the public the bomber wrote letters telling them to take it down and eventually told them why he was mad at the company. From that letter they were able to find out who the man was and arrested him. The psychiatrist was pretty much right on about the profile of who the guy was, but it was also a lot of common since and the bomber ultimately gave them a lot of information for them to work with in finding out who he was. Serial killers is a main reason profiling ever came about, in helps for the FBI and police to find who the serial killers were. There are not set characteristics of serial killers but there are some basic ones. Some characteristics of serial killers are suffering from brain injury that impairs rational thinking, experiencing some sort of abuse during childhood, and almost all are white males that are of average intelligence. The list goes on but those are some main characteristics of serial killers.
While reading this chapter I found it surprising that most serial killers are white males and of average intelligence. Just means it’s hard to know if they are a serial killer because it they are “normal looking” how are you supposed to know. I also saw the pictures on page 107 of the serial killers listed and looked up John Wayne Gacy to find out he lived in Waterloo, Iowa and was put in Prison in Anamosa. I had no idea about that so that was very surprising.
I did not know a whole lot about profiling before reading this so I would not say none of my ideas about profiling was debunked. I guess I thought profiling was more common and more people were profilers than only about 12 or so that really are.
I wanted to learn more about racial profiling so I got some more information on it….
This article starts off with a story about a man that is stopped for speeding only and it turns into the police officer calling for back up, searching his car for drugs, and a huge mess. In the end the man is left with just a speeding ticket but also humiliation and frustration, while the officers drive off like nothing happened. It then tells more about racial profiling and how real it really is in the end of the article
http://reason.com/archives/2001/08/01/the-roots-of-racial-profiling
This article has lots of facts about racial profiling and who all it affects. It is good because it shows more often than many of you may realize and it is a real thing.
http://www.amnestyusa.org/racial_profiling/sevenfacts.html

Chapter 5 In C&K focuses on Criminal Profiling and different techniques used to develop inferences on possible happenings of a crime or to generate a pool of suspected criminals.The opening excerpt from that of Silence of the Lambs had me very intrigued from the get go as it is one of my favorite movies of all time and the idea that I personally love Anthony Hopkins and his brilliant job in playing his role. Starling who is a FBI agent in the movie is shown here developing a criminal profile by that of looking at photographs and other evidence. Although this is a movie, her "profile" turns out to be right on cue. I loved the introduction by the author here to introduce the topic with a common media example we can all refer to. Profiling, as Starling displayed, is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and characteristics based upon the crime scene and other evidence, also known as Deductive Profiling.
When the common citizen thinks of a profiling agent one would think they are rather common as the media displays. In fact there are only about a dozen FBI agents alone who specialize in profiling. When we think of profiling it is obvious that the term itself is applied to the popular cases in that of serial killers, murderers who kill three or more people on different occasions and have a "cooling-off" period. The reasoning for the attraction to these types of cases point to several explanations. 1.) We can conclude that the criminal will continue until caught. 2.) Serious drawbacks may be forecast in that the probability of a repeat is highly likely. and 3.) May help lower the chances for future related crimes. When initially creating a profile the agent creates a description based upon the crime scene, information about the victims, police reports, and autopsy reports. These then constituted "profiles" are given to law enforcement as possible leads and to help focus the efforts of solving the crime at hand.
The chapter also introduced the key term "signature" when generating a profile for a criminal act. This signature is defined as a distinctive, personal aspect of the crime that reveals personality of the killer, for example being one who tortures or performs sexual activity. In better explaining this one knows that a serial killer may change the vehicle he uses or how he rids of the body but the signature will always remain the same due to the fact that it is this signature that shows his trademark or his personal appeal to the murders. In Silence of the Lambs there is a fantastic example of this in that Buffalo Bill, the murder on the loose, uses a moth in which he lodges down each victims throat to symbolize his transformation into a women like that of a moth from a cacoon.
The chapter then introduces three famous profiles that have been noted in the past and uses their criteria to analyze the accuracy. Jack the Ripper was used first in that this may be the first actual account of a profile itself, but cannot be confirmed as "the Ripper" was never caught. The Olympic Bomber was second and is a case that boggled my mind. Through profiling they assumed that the suspect was a "cop wannabe" and took this instinct to soon arrest a security guard, only to later find out that they were wrong and soon caught Eric Rudolph and planted him with the conviction. This shows an error in profiling in that just because he was portrayed to be a "cop wannabe" they jumped the gun and arrested an individual who had no real connection with the crime itself which shows how profiling can in essence help the criminal be free longer in that if the profile is inaccurate then the search is narrowed within a scope that leaves him out and buys him more time. Lastly, the Mad Bomber was introduced as he was the individual who randomly placed bombs through NY to in reality get back at his former place of employment. Here the psychiatrist, James Brussel, showed to have a few relevant connections (being quiet common sense)but also had many assumptions that were way off when comparing his profile to that of the actual bomber.
Next the book divided the characteristics of Serial Killers up into two different categories. One being that of Organized Killers who carefully select and plan out their scheme's and what they will do with their victims. The other, Disorganized Killers tend to be impulsive and pick their victims at random with a sort of carelessness approach to the whole ordeal. Organized Killers plan their crimes, may have a controlled conversation with their victim, display self-control, hide the body, take the weapon with them, and may even transport the victim away from the scene. On the other hand Disorganized Killers act in a spontaneous fashion, leave the scene sloppy, leave body in plain view, leave the weapon behind, and seem to have sex after the death not caring of the possible consequences of DNA.
Research on profiling and the many techniques used to formulate an outcome were also touched upon. Current research has shown in a study that yes profiling is a nice tool, but has in reality only led to the identification of the perpetrator in 2.7% of the cases. Profiling agents have been shown to be less accurate then once thought in that they may cause investigators to look for the wrong type of person or show a judgment that is based not only facts but on instinct which is never put to test by any scientific means. Context is also shown to matter in that profiles stress one to look for how the criminal acted at the scene but forgets the fact that people have different emotional states when in different settings and if the killer is not in the context of the scene, then looking for those exact characteristics post-crime when in fact they may have changed would lead the search to be a dead end road or create a sort of tunnel vision.
Geographic Profiling is an alternative to Intuition profiling and may show to be more reliable. This type of profiling relies on maps and mathematics and how key locations are associated with serial crimes and not on instinct and inference like that of the intuitive approach. This mapping may involve marks or where the bodies were dropped, where the crimes occured, and potential places for the next crime. This may help investigators develop stakeouts, traps, and even where to find potential witnesses.
Psychological Autopsies are also used in an effort to examine the psychological state of a person prior to his or her death. The goal of these autopsies is to develop a dead person's emotional state, personality, thoughts, and lifestyle prior to death to determine the classification of the death in deciding if it was natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide (NASH system). Although an intriguing process, they must rely on less direct sources of evidence like letters, emails, cell phone records, audio/video recordings, interviews with family and friends, and all other minute details that will establish this checklist in determining if indeed it was an equivocal death (not clear reason why a person died)or an obvious NASH system classification.
In reading the chapter I found it surprising to learn about the type of profiling known as Geographic Profiling in how it compares to that of the Intuitive approach. I have always known that they pin pointed certain locations in hopes to formulate a trend that may lead to conclusion, but have never realized that there are currently computer software programs, "Predator" and "Dragnet," that actually crunch this data and plot a detailed computerized map. The maps highlight proximity to home, dumping of bodies, high crime areas, and even a so called comfort zone. It was very surprising to read this and think about how this can be used to zone in on a suspect although it has proven to be wrong in some points, I still find it fascinating.
I did have an idea debunked by reading this chapter on criminal profiling. The honest part that I had not a clue about was how rare the actual profiling career is. I had just assumed each major police force/department had an issued profiling agent and their were mass amounts of them and had never realized how rare they are and how weak the chances are of becoming one in that you are selected to become one and it is not based on a college resume or certain degree maintained.
Something that I would like to learn more about after reading this chapter would be that of Probative Evidence. Probative evidence provides information that is useful in assessing whether or not a person committed a crime. When a case makes it to court each side is in trek to prove their cases by the introduction of evidence. There are rules of evidence within a court room and only certain types that are admissible. For evidence to be deemed credible it must prove or help prove a fact of issue referring to the case. If the evidence is proved credible then it is coined probative, which is evidence that contributes to proof in that this evidence makes its existence more probable or less probable when referring to the final resolution. Although in some cases this probative evidence may be dismissed due to it causing problems in the trial like misleading the jury or creating an unfair prejudice, it is this evidence that can really alter the sides of the courtroom and proper use of it may in fact change the outcome of the whole trial.

Websites used:

http://law.jrank.org/pages/9454/Probative.html

http://www.duhaime.org/LegalDictionary/P/Probative.aspx

Chapter 5 included all sorts of information regarding Criminal Profiling...

The chapter begins by explaining an all too famous movie which showcases profiling: Silence of the Lambs. By profiling, it is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence.
Chapter 5 then sheds some light on the fact that profiling is not concrete evidence and that the process is not too common.

Chapter 5 then began to take the reader through various crime cases in which profiling was used. Different areas of profiling were explained such as getting usable information just from the knowledge of whether a crime scene was organized of disorganized. Assumptions and stereotyping can easily get in the way of profiling. It is when personal ideas get in the way, that is when you have tainted results.

This article discusses the false implications of profiling in the media..and how stereotypes get in the way:

http://ask.metafilter.com/19753/Whats-wrong-with-Racial-Profiling


A process called tunnel vision was also really interesting to read about. This is when you have such detailed information about a particular perpetrator that you turn down anyone who does not fit every point to a "T." What I learned that surprised me was the fact that profiling seems so successful, I want to know about how it has failed and I'd like to read examples about how profiling has strayed detectives.

The fact that someone completely unrelated to a particular crime can claim they have analyzed all of this information to create a profile is crazy to me. How can we trust that assumptions aren't at the center of their evidence? Profiles are important though, and I do believe this, but it is when a particular profile is finally created, I feel it is unfair to use this as credible evidence you can now go and compare people to. Of course it can give you an idea, and a starting point but to base all of your concrete evidences on a profile I feel is slightly obscure. Our perceptions and human gut, should never be proper forms of evidence, yet we convince the jury that we have properly solved a particular crime. Human nature is purely not enough to be held at such high regards. To define human behaviors and to explain these behaviors based on assumptions is a risky thing to do. Real people are involved, real evidence should be a given.
It also depends on who your pro-filer is. If you have someone who bases their own assumptions and uses their own stereotypes when conducting a profile, you are in big trouble. It is practically impossible to erase your own judgments and ideas from your research, but it is absolutely imperative that you do so.


This article talks about how profiling is worse than useless

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/sep/14/psychological-profile-behavioural-psychology

"But according to a team of psychologists at Birmingham City University, the practice of offender profiling is deeply unscientific and risks bringing the field into disrepute."

I enjoyed reading how profiling isn't this fairy tale situation that works 100% of the time. It was nice to read the opposite end of the spectrum.

Chapter 5 is about Criminal Profiling and Psychological Autopsies. It starts off talking about how this portion of law enforcement became a part of pop culture. It discusses how The Silence of the Lambs was the nation’s first real taste on the subject. Starling, the film’s main character, is spot on when giving an impromptu profile for the identity of a killer. She describes him very accurately; giving the impression profiling is very easy. Many other shows, like Criminal Minds for example, also give the public the impression profiling is a sure thing and there are no mistakes made. This is not an accurate depiction of profiling.
The true definition of profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. This is not an easy process and doesn’t always work, as we learned in class today. One thing profilers focus on is the signature of the crime. The signature is something that doesn’t change and is assumed to reveal something about the criminal. It is considered the thing that “fulfills him emotionally.” It is not the same thing as the killers MO, however. The MO is how the killer kills, the signature is not necessary to the crime. Knowledge in psychology can be very useful here. Different characteristics in the crimes of a serial killer, for example, can give many clues about the perpetrator. If the crime scene reflects control, well thought out actions, the criminal is considered an organized murderer. This person is more likely to be sane, but just not care about what they are doing. If the crime scene is very disorganized and seems random, the person is more than likely insane and in a fantasy world where what he or she is doing isn’t wrong. These two categories seem much too broad so more categories (visionary, mission-oriented, hedonistic, and power-oriented killers) were added for consideration. Although a serial killer may not fall neatly into one of these, they are more than likely going to belong to one of them heavily.
This all seems like it would be very helpful, but it could be placed into the “too-good-to-be-true” category. They are not psychics, so they are not right all of the time. They need to be considered just another lead, not the absolute solution to the crime. They can help give the investigators get more leads and point them in the right direction, but rarely, if ever, will profilers be able to provide a name. I guess I knew this before, but it is still a little surprising how little profiles can help. I guess I have been watching TV and movies on the subject for so long that they are glorified in my mind. In reality, the research says most profiles are “riddled with inaccuracies and inconsistencies.” They also can lead investigators down the wrong path and give them tunnel vision. If the perpetrator doesn’t fit a faulty profile, he may be immediately excluded.
Geographic profiling can solve this problem of faulty and inconsistent profiling. When multiple crimes are committed in an area, a geographic profile can narrow the range of the probability of where the criminal lives. The computer programs looks for an anchor point from where the attacks might be launched and a buffer zone around the home where he is less likely to commit crimes. This could also have something to do with social psychology which is how people influence people around them. The criminal may want to make sure he commits crimes where he would blend in, or maybe where the citizens are less observant. This topic is interesting to me and is more reliable than regular profiling. It still has flaws, but is more reliable than inferences made by profilers. It uses numbers and not assumptions.
http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com/geographic-profiling.html

Chapter 5 started out with the author talking about a movie called "the silence of the lambs, I believe that the author used this movie to educate his readers of what is Profiling and how it is used to in identifing or liming the suspect of a serial killer. The author then went on talking about the three famous profileing casesses, these casesses where Jack the rapper, The Olympic Bomber and the Mad Bomber. I felt that theses casesses was used to identify the different way in which profiling may work or may not work. For example: the author used the Olympic Bomber case was identify to prove that profiling does not alway work, I state this because in the article that explained the Olympic bomber case, the FBI "instructed police to search for a single, white, middle-class male with an intense interest in police work and law enforcement". As police fowlled the profiling of the FBI they found a man name Richard Jewell fitting their suspect, as he became their suspect he also be came the world suspect and becoming the world suspect meant his life was all down hill, his reputation went down with it too. To me Jewell was wrongfulling accused only because the system was looking for someone to blame for the Olympic Bomber case cause at the end Jewell became a free man with a bad reputation all
because of the system of false profiling.
As I keeped reading, I notice that research have proving that their is a difference between
characteristics of a serial killers and none serial killers. With that said I was suppressed to know that nearly all serial killers are white males that are typically of average intelligence.
I was surprised to know this fact because growing up In Liberia and in Chicago I was
alway told to watch out for black men in the age group of 25-45 , in the middle class, and
who intelligence are at a higher level, men like this are seen as rapist and serial killers;
but I guess they are not any more, but how is nearly all serial killers are whit males when
black males are seen as a theart to society it's-self? Well I believe his is seen very
differently in every race because my mother and my grand mother always told me and my
sisters to look around and never talk to black men around that age.
While reading I also learned about the different types of of profiling and how it is used, I
learned about geographic profiling and how most serial killer always commite the same
crimes in or around the same area and that's when geographic profiling comes into place
because "investigators assume that a serial offender stays with in a geographic comfort
zone. Now is this statement reply true I wonder, assume I was a serial killer and I keep
killing in the same area the same way... Wouldend my risk of getting cought be very high,
and If I know that my risk is high why will I keep killing in that area? This just don't make
scen to me, I guess I can say geographic profiling don't really work for a smart serial killer.
Chapter 5 was really fun to read but I will like to learn more about the difference between
an organized and disorganized crime scenes and can a disorganized crime be hard to put
together sometime or is it always eazy to solve.

http://www.liv.ac.uk/Psychology/staff/LAlison/lalison9.pdf
http://psychautopsy.weebly.com/organized-vs-disorganized.html

On both pages I learned that "Organized offenders are psychopathic and antisocial, irrational but sane" and "Disorganized offender is psychotic with non-existent social skills".
With that said I believe that a disorganized crime will alway be eazy to solve then an none disorganized crime why because it prove that one who is a disorganized killer will alway make a mistice weather it's talking about the crime in the wrong place at a wrong time or leaving the murderwepon at the crime scene with his finger prints on it.

According to Chapter 5, "profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence" We discussed in class and the book mentions that there are 2 kinds of profiling: deductive and inductive. Deductive profiling uses crime scene data to try and infer certain characteristics about the crime, victim, and suspect. Inductive profiling uses statistics, such as prison data, to say who "normally" commit a crime. The book goes on to describe three famous profiles. The first being Jack the Ripper, a serial rapists who mutilated his victims in East London. The cops dubbed him a daring, psychically strong but quiet looking, and rather lonely man. In this particular case, however, the real ripper was never found so there is no telling how accurate the profile was. This case had to have lead to psychological distress for all those investigating and all those who knew the victims. Clinical psychology may have even been needed in some cases, and probably would have helped Jack the Ripper with his gruesome obsession. The next profile was the Olympic Bomber, a weird case to profile being that it was a one time crime. This profile led to a wrong accusation of a security guard, his picture was even posted all around the nation by the FBI. The FBI later admitted to having no evidence on the poor falsely accused man. Later a man was arrested was, Eric Rudolph an antiabortion activists. This is a great example of profiling going wrong. The third profile discussed by the book was the "Mad Bomber". This case lead to an accurate profile but did not ultimately solve the case. (see other assignment for more details on that case).
Profiling is most commonly used in cases of serial killers. There are two types of crimes, organized and disorganized. Organize crime scenes are planned crime and an organized murderer is usually intelligent and competent. Disorganized crime scenes are random and might even have a weapon left while disorganized murderers are usually not that smart and incompetent.
A part that I found interesting in the book was a classification scheme proposed by Ronald Holmes. Holmes states that most serial killers can be placed into four categories. Visionary types are psychotic, having visions that God told them to commit a crime. Mission-oriented types are usually crimes that are carried out to kill people that are evil.(like Dexter).Hedonistic types are people that kill for fun and often have sadistic sexual fantasies. Last but not least, power-oriented killers get their delight by powering their victims before murdering them.
There is then a section on research covering the matter of profiling. It was interesting, and a little weary, to find out that there was no real difference between experts your average joe in creating an accurate profile. This is something that is portrayed so heavily in the media and appears to be flawless. Obviously not and as we learned in class today there are only a handful of full time profilers in the nation. There are of course, persistent problems with profiling that the book discusses. Profiling can lead to tunnel vision, excluding the real perpetrator because he does not meet a certain profile. Going down dead ends and false accusations are other clear problems with profiling.
The book then lead to a more promising form of profiling: geographic profiling. Statistical information such as location is more reliable than psychological infers but geographic profiling still has its problems. The book discusses the inability of cops to solve a particular crime due to their assumption that the perpetrator had a buffer zone. (home where they are less likely to commit crime). Turned out the criminals actually had no home, traveling a lot, making it impossible to accurately use the technology of geographical profiling.
Lastly, the book discusses psychological autopsies. This is what I found the most interesting to learn about. A psychological autopsy is according to the book, "effort to dissect and examine the psychological state of a person prior to his or her death. I assume that this topic interests me due to the several, unforeseeable suicides that my high school experienced. The funerals all happened to fast and peacefully after my classmate death and it is weird to think that a psychological autopsy probably occurred behind closed doors. Using the NASH system, an examiner depicts whether the death was natural, accidental, suicidal, or homicidal. Psychological autopsies are rarely permitted in court but limited forms are. In one such case, a mother was found reliable for her daughter's suicide. The mother forced her daughter to underage dance, pay rent money,and did not allow her to quit her shameful job. Clearly, the poor daughter, Tina Mancini, was suffering from many psychological factors such as abuse and neglect.

2 links I used for this:
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/157/9/1532
http://www.scribd.com/doc/13320963/Criminal-Profiling-Principles-and-Practice

Chapter 5 of C & K focuses on profiling and psychological autopsies. Profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. Profiling is one area of the criminal justice system in which psychology can be widely used in many different forms. The techniques of criminal profiling were forged by the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit. Profiling is most commonly used in serial killer cases. In such cases criminal profilers put special emphasis on the signature, which is the distinctive aspect of the crime that displays the character of the killer. Although there is no list of characteristics that describe serial killers, many suffer from brain injury that impairs rational thinking, while most have also experienced some combination of physical, sexual, and psychological abuse during childhood. Serial killers are almost always white males, with average intelligence.

If useful, profilers will distinguish between organized and disorganized murderers. Organized killers carefully select and stalk their victims, plan out what they will do, wait for the right opportunity, discard of evidence carefully, and usually use more elaborate rituals in carrying out there killings. In contrast, disorganized killers are impulsive, random, acting out unexpected rage, use a weapon of convenience, leave the weapon at the crime scene, and use the dead body for sexual purposes. This classification of organized or disorganized led inferences about personality and circumstances of the killer. This simple distinction has been very influential in creating profiles over the years. However, as profiling has developed, a new classification scheme has as well. Visionary types are usually psychotic, believing the have visions or hear voices telling them to kill. Mission oriented killers are less likely to be psychotic and are motivated to kill people who they view as unworthy. Hedonistic murderers kill for the thrill and enjoy sadistic sexual pleasure in torturing victims. Finally, power oriented types get satisfaction from capturing and controlling their victims before killing.

Chapter 14 also discussed other methods of profiling, specifically geographic profiling and psychological autopsies. Geographic profiling relies on maps and mathematics to help catch criminals. As the number of crimes increases, so does the usefulness of the spatial map. Spatial mapping uses computer programming that looks at things such as an anchor point from where attacks may be launched, some also assume a buffer zone, where the criminal is less likely to commit crimes. Programs also consider distance decay, which shows the probability of an attack decreasing as the distance from previous crimes becomes greater. Psychological autopsies are an effort to examine the psychological state of a person prior to their death. People who perform these autopsies closely examine the bodies, while also performing a psychological analysis by looking at sources such as letters, e-mails, journal entries, cell phone records, bank account. Interviews with family, friends and co-workers are all used to reconstruct the deceased emotional state prior to death. Researchers have developed systems tools such as the NASH system for death classification, as well as the checklists to assist medical examiners in distinguishing whether individual cases were accidental or suicide. These checklists have actually proven to be 92% accurate in distinguish between the two types of.
The most surprising thing to me also probably debunked a naïve belief I had about profiling. Although the statistics in the book may not be accurate, because there is such a low number of test participants, the validity of the profilers could be questionable, and in one particular study there may have been a bias against the profilers. Regardless, one study in England determined that profiling led to the identification of the perpetrator only 2.7% of the time. Another study looked at the accuracy of profilers and found that profilers were accurate about 50% of the time. However, we have no good evidence of how profiles have been useful or useless and counterproductive. I must admit I am a huge fan of the show “Criminal Minds” and profiling intrigues me. However, I know it is a show and they write the material, making it seem more accurate and precise then it actually is.

I really wanted to find some more statistics on how accurate methods of profiling can be, but I only found one focusing on the classification stage particularly organized vs. disorganized. The only available study that examines the reliability of the classification system involved the reading of a sexual-homicide case summary. In this study, interrater reliability was found to be between 51.7% and 92.6%.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI_method_of_profiling

I also wanted to find out how much psychology is used compared to logic in profiling. I know this is a very broad question and I’m not sure there is any definitive answer whatsoever. However, I could find no real answers to this question either, if anyone else has some answers feel free to reply. I think getting a better understanding for criminal profiling is one of the only ways to answer this question.

In chapter 5, the authors of the textbook describe profiling as the process of making assumptions about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics. These inferences are drawn after viewing the actual crime scene. A profiler tries to put themselves in the mind of not only the criminal but the victim in the scene as well. The profiler tries to detail the criminal’s personality. The criminal’s personality could infer why the crime occurred. The authors also describe that profiles have been used to identify and find serial killers. However, there is no one description to portray a serial killer. There are some characteristics, though, that have been recurring. For example, the authors share that many serial killers have suffered a brain injury and may have experienced some sort of abuse in one’s childhood. The authors go on to say that many serial killers have been identified as average intelligent, white males. I was not surprised to read that serial killers often tend to be under the influence of drugs and alcohol during their act. For me, I found it a little disturbing to learn that serial killers make videotapes just so they could watch their acts over and over.
The authors mention, many times profiles have led police in the wrong direction. However, some profiles have led to the criminals as well. Overall, I learned that profiling is not really reliable and not used that often. Characteristics of several serial killers does not generalize to identify all serial killers. Many times, police officers focus too much on the profiling and demonstrate “tunnel vision.” Tunnel vision occurs when officers follow the profile specifically, not looking for any other signs or persons who could be linked to the crime, even though profiles can be misleading. Sometimes profiles come with stereotypes. The authors state, “Some people become suspects because they stand out.” The people who stand out tend to gesture or perform something that seems dangerous. I thought it was also interesting to read, “Jurors may use their own intuitive profiles to help them decide whether or not the defendant is guilty.” Stereotypes definitely play a role in profiling and the decisions in the legal system.
I thought it was also interesting to learn about psychological autopsies. When a person dies, a psychological autopsy is may be done in effort to examine and identify the person’s psychological state before he/she died. An autopsy can reveal injuries to the brain or other organ’s of the corpse that could possibly have led to the person’s death. Other evidence, such as letters or journals, may have been left behind to describe the actions and thoughts that contribute to a person’s emotional state before one dies. I was surprised to learn that the 16-issue checklist (listed in chapter 5) was pretty accurate in describing and distinguishing the classification of deaths.
I decided to look further into the subject of psychological autopsies. I learned information is gathered from interviews with family members and friends, as well as, police reports, medical records, and personal documents. I also thought it was interesting to learn that a psychological autopsy is used to investigate a single death in order to clarify why or how a person died. This information is good to be used in the clinical and legal setting. The results or interpretation of the autopsy help family members and friends understand how and why tragic death may have occurred. These autopsies can also lead to suggesting how to teach persons to prevent suicides.Overall, I thought this chapter was quite interesting. I was surprised to learn that profiling is not very reliable.
http://www.deathreference.com/A-Bi/Autopsy-Psychological.html
http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com/psychological-autopsy.html

The chapter talks about the ins and outs of profiling. I was surprised that the Jack the Ripper case was used in this chapter even though now that I think of it, it makes perfect sense. Jack the Ripper was just one of three cases in the beginning of the book that demonstrated how profiling is used. All thought the case still remains unsolved, the Olympic Bomber and the Mad Bomber were also used to show just how accurate some profiles can be. Under Characteristics of Serial Killers, there is Table 5.1. I found this interesting just because the characteristics all made sense but they seemed almost too obvious and vague to be something so groundbreaking in a case. There was also a study done to see just how unique profiling was as a skill. I wasn’t too impressed with the findings really, I thought the profilers would score significantly higher than everyone else. It made me question for a minute if profiling couldn’t just be taught to other investigators to save time and money from bring someone new in on a case when a profiler can be used. The two problems with profiling that it creates tunnel vision for investigators and promotes stereotypes. If the profiler is wrong, then the investigators are going to be chasing after the wrong person and may never get the case closed. Who is going to use a profile as evidence in court when all the defendant has to do is find someone who also fits the profile and say it was them instead. This can cause a lot of problems and could let some criminal go free because they did commit the crime but the only ‘evidence’ the prosecution has is the profile.

I thought psychological autopsies sounded interesting based on how it was used in the Jackson vs. State of Florida case. I think that in this context, it really made a difference in how the court looks at the charges. The website I found procieved psychological autopsies as a collection tool used by investigators. The website when and how psychological autopsies are valid and when they are used on a broader field.

http://www.all-about-forensic-psychology.com/psychological-autopsy.html

Chapter 5, Criminal Profiling and Psychological Autopsies, starts out talking about the profiling process and how it originated in the United States and is now used all over the world. Profiling is used most importantly with serial killers, the book describes exactly what a serial killer is, “murderers who kill three or more people in separate events with a cooling-off period between murders” (pg. 98). The process includes looking at the crime scene, learning as much about the victims as possible, and going over all information gathered by the police or medical examiner. One of the main things profilers look for is the “signature” of a crime which is some aspect that is personal to the murderer and something that appears consistently in their crimes. The chapter goes on to talk about the profile made for Jack the Ripper, which was never solved; the Olympic Bomber, which led the police to believe it was the wrong man; and the Mad Bomber, which as a very detailed and mostly accurate profile of a bomber in the mid 20th Century. Next, characteristics of serial killers are discussed. One characteristic that shocked me was that mostly all serial killers are white males of average intelligence. I had heard that before and it is just a very eerie characteristic that seems hard to believe. Also, it talks about how many serial killers kill out of power and/or sexual fantasies. It also lists the differences between organized killers, who tend to plan most of the crime out and have a victim chosen before the crime occurs; and disorganized killers, who are of lower intelligence levels and are a lot more spontaneous and sloppy about their killings. There are four general types that serial killers can be connected to and those include visionary, hedonistic, mission-oriented, and power-oriented. The research that has come of profiling is rather disheartening. The book states, “…profiling led to the identification of the perpetrator in only 2.7% of the cases” (pg. 105). In this section it also talks about how profilers were a lot better at determining more accurate profilers of sexual offenses than murders, and still the number of accurate profiles was rather low. The cross-situational consistency of a crime is also looked at in a later section. The book nicely relates it to one’s behavior in a library is going to be very different from their behavior at parties. This cross-situational consistency makes case linkage rather difficult. Another element that makes profiling somewhat unreliable is the vagueness and difficulty to confirm certain named characteristics. This section talked about the BTK Killer and how they said things like he would be either married or divorced, been with women much older or much younger than himself, and either low or middle class. Some problems are discussed with profiling such as tunnel vision which may lead an investigation to look for only characteristics of what the profiler has come up with, which may lead them to miss other key elements and leads their investigation in a wild goose chase. Geographic profiling is different from psychological profiling in that it deals with mathematics and maps according to the book. This has to deal with more of where to look, not what to look for. Geographic profiling involves the anchor point, which is where the crimes start from, the buffer zone, which is an area near the criminal’s home that he is unlikely to commit crime in, and the distance decay. The next section discussed how profiling can be used to a trial and may be used to twist something that may have been an accident into a premeditated act, like in the case of the couple who were in the snowmobile accident and the wife ended up drowning in a puddle while the husband was face up. The last section talks about Psychological Autopsies and the NASH System which is used for the classification of death which includes natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide. The book states, “a psychological autopsy is an effort to dissect and examine the psychological state of a person prior to his or her death” (pg. 115). It also talks about the checklists medical examiners use to distinguish between suicide and accidental deaths. Lastly, it discusses the use of psychological autopsies in court and how they are generally used in civil cases and not usually permitted in criminal cases. I read a lot about the history of psychological autopsies which included information on the most likely first psychological autopsy ever which was done by Gregory Zilboorg who was investigating a long string of suicides of police officers in New York City. It also talks about how psychological autopsies are often done after deaths of famous people or when questions about one’s will come into play. http://www.deathreference.com/A-Bi/Autopsy-Psychological.html

Chapter 5 deals with profiling and psychological autopsies. The ‘introduction’ to the chapter started with the profiling of the serial killer in “Silence of the Lambs.” The chapter talks about the process of profiling and how it began in the FBI’s behavioral sciences unit and has been used in several countries throughout the world. However, there are VERY few actual profilers as it is not really a division in the FBI. Agents have to be handpicked to become a profiler. It talked about the different ways profilers create one, based on a signature, crime scene evidence and previous ‘profiles’ of similar offenders. The profiles created can help lead police to the true perpetrator and can even help police when questioning suspects. Profiling, according to the chapter relies on the skill of the profiler and their experiences in working with people. Next, the chapter moved on to discuss the profiles of Jack the Ripper, the Olympic bomber and the Mad Bomber (George Metesky) which we read about in Minds on Trial. The profile of Jack the Ripper was done by Dr. Thomas Bond. This is considered to be the first criminal profile. The profile was as follows: great physical strength, coolness and daring, middle-aged man, neat and respectably dressed, wears a cloak or overcoat and a man without regular occupation. Bond used different characteristics from both the crime scene, as well as the assumption that a man who committed the brutal murders that Jack the Ripper did had to be cool and collective as to not be upset by the heinous crimes. The next profile, the Olympic Bomber, was done by the FBI. They believed the bomber was a white, middle-class male who was interested in police work. This vague profile led police to the wrong man at first, but eventually the true offender was charged and convicted. Finally, the Mad Bomber, was profiled as being a man, 40-50, Roman Catholic, an immigrant or the offspring of one, single and live with female relatives as well as paranoid and a former or current employer of Con Edison, the places most of the bombs were planted. When Metesky was arrested for being the bomber he fit the profile exactly. The chapter then moved on to discussing characteristics of serial killers. However, there is no one list that can encompass everything! Most suffer from brain injuries that impair thinking, have been abused (sexually, emotionally, physically or mentally). Almost all are white males who expressed cruelty to animals as a child and are alcoholics. They are interested in porn and in the violence/domination of one person over another. Often times the videotape crimes or take something from the victim to remember it and the rush they got from it. After discussing common characteristics, the chapter moved on to discussing differences between organized and unorganized killers. To sum it up, organized killers go in with a plan and have ‘rationally’ thought out what they are doing. Disorganized killers seem to be in a hurry, on the go and often leave evidence behind in their frenzied attacks. Ronald Holmes later created the different types of killings. Visionary types are usually based on psychotic killings. They heard voices, or God told them to kill someone. Mission-oriented types are motivated to kill people they feel are unworthy of living or have done something evil…or are just evil in nature. Hedonistic types kill for the sadistic nature of it. They find pleasure in the killing and sexual nature of torturing and murdering. Finally, power-oriented, people get a thrill from having power, control and dominance over their victim. Serial killers don’t necessarily fall into one category, but often make up several different categories. Next, the research on profiling talked about the evidence that profiling is effective. It has been a slow task however. After discussing this in depth it talked about different problems associated with profiling. These problems include assumptions, cross-situational consistency, the utility of inferences and persistent problems. Assumptions can prevent the real facts from being noticed if people assume things about a crime scene or offender that may not be true. Cross-situational consistency deals with the consistency of the behavior of an offender. Different situations can create different profiles. Inferences can deal too much with speculation that may end up being incorrect in the end and send police on a wild goose chase. Persistent problems can lead to a tunnel vision when you only look for people who fit the profile instead of paying attention to other evidence that may point in different directions. Finally, the chapter ended with psychological autopsies. This helps determine what may have happened in deaths in which it is not entirely clear. It can often help determine whether something was natural, accidental, suicide or homicide (NASH). It requires medical examiners to look at the context surrounding a death and takes into account MANY factors to determine what the cause of death was (as far as NASH). This is important for many reasons such as insurance purposes, family closure, investigation into a death, etc. For example, if someone was found in their car at the bottom of a hill dead, the psychological autopsy could help determine if the person was suicidal and left behind a note or had attempted suicide before. The goal of a psychological autopsy is to examine the person’s life before they died…their emotional state, personality and all around lifestyle.
I didn’t have any of my beliefs debunked because I hadn’t really known very much about profiling. I didn’t know that it wasn’t scientifically valid, but one could assume so. I know that I would sure hate to be convicted of a crime because I matched a ‘profile’ that was created by someone’s educated guesses in a sense. I was very surprised at all the information that is taken into account however. I also was surprised that one had been created for Jack the Ripper. That seems like a long time ago, before psychology really seemed to play a part in things, so for a profile to be created to solve a serial killer crisis seems very advanced.
While reading I was interested in more information on serial killers. I remembered that a long time ago I heard of a ‘checklist’ of who grows up to be a serial killer so I looked into that. It was the 14 characteristics of a serial killer from Dr. Phil.
1. Over 90 percent of serial killers are male.
2. They tend to be intelligent, with IQ's in the "bright normal" range.
3. They do poorly in school, have trouble holding down jobs, and often work as unskilled laborers.
4. They tend to come from markedly unstable families.
5. As children, they are abandoned by their fathers and raised by domineering mothers.
6. Their families often have criminal, psychiatric and alcoholic histories.
7. They hate their fathers and mothers.
8. They are commonly abused as children — psychologically, physically and sexually. Often the abuse is by a family member.
9. Many serial killers spend time in institutions as children and have records of early psychiatric problems.
10. They have high rates of suicide attempts.
11. From an early age, many are intensely interested in voyeurism, fetishism, and sado-masochistic pornography.
12. More than 60 percent of serial killers wet their beds beyond the age of 12.
13. Many serial killers are fascinated with fire starting.
14. They are involved with sadistic activity or tormenting small creatures.
Other factors included that I found can be daydreaming, chronic lying, nightmares, poor self esteem and body image, etc. Now I know that this isn’t by any means a complete list that if you have these qualities that you will be a serial killer, but it’s interesting that it can be narrowed to a list of 14 from among some of the most notorious serial killers. These were traits that were prevalent in a majority of them. It makes you wonder if you knew this ahead of time if something could have been done to stop them. Would many lives have been saved, or was it just in their blood to be the killers that they were? I am very interested in serial killers and always have been, so this was an interesting chapter to read about different ways that the FBI has put together a profile to help police capture some of the most dangerous people in our society. It seems like even though it may be a true science and it does lead police down the wrong path often times, it eventually leads to the capture of dangerous criminals and the benefits outweigh the cons…at least in my opinion.
http://drphil.com/articles/article/188
http://serialkillr.tripod.com/SerialKillersExposed/characteristics.html

In chapter five of Costanza and Krauss' book they talked about criminal profiling and psychological autopsies. The chapter began talking about how profiling became more of a widely recognized concept because of the movie Silence of the Lambs. The actual definition of profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. The chapter then goes on to talk about three different cases and the effectiveness on profiling. These cases include Jack the Ripper, the Olympic Bomber,and the Mad Bomber. Jack the Ripper terrorized the East End of London, strangling and slitting the throats of at least five prostitudes. The Olympic Bomber was profiled as single, white, middle-class male who bombed the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. The Mad Bomber was a man who left multiple bombs throughout New York in an attempt to seek justice for his on the job injury at Consolidate Edison. The chapter then breaks down the different types of serial killers and the different types of crime scenes: organized and unorganized.

The chapter also talks about psychological autopsies. The definition of psychological autopsies is an effort to dissect and examine the psychological state of a person prior to his or her death. The autopsy-like psychological analysis must rely on less direct sources of evidence which can include letters, emails, journal entries, cell phone records, audio or video recordings, bank accounts, and student or employee records left behind by the deceased. One of the things that I read which was rather surprising to me was the fact that profiling led to the identification of a perpetrator in only 2.7% of the cases and when researchers examined the actual profiles created for the police, they found that most profiles were "riddled with inaccuracies and inconsistencies." I always sort of thought that the work of profiling could be rather unreliable at times and this fact just made me realize how unreliable it really is. I was also surprised to learned that all not all psychopaths are psychotic. The book states that in contrast to people with psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, who often lose contact with reality, psychopaths are almost always rational. They are well aware that their ill-advised or illegal actions are wrong in the eyes of society but shrug off these concerns with startling nonchalance.

One of the things that I wanted to learn more about was the organized and unorganized killers and crime scenes. I think it's fascinating to get into the minds of these killers and see how they planned or didn't plan things. The FBI's behavioral specialists have compiled the Crime Classification Manual, which categorizes murder into four main groups: criminal enterprise homicide (category 100); personal cause homicide (category 120); sexual homicide (category 130); and group cause homicide (category 140). There is no separate category for serial killing; serial homicides fall into the various categories depending on the their type. The most common group where serial homicides frequently occur is category 130: sexual homicide. That group is divided into subcategories that include the following: (131) organized sexual homicide, (132) disorganized sexual homicide, and (133) mixed sexual homicide. http://www.helium.com/items/666219-organized-versus-disorganized-serial-killers

In chapter 5, the phenomenon of profiling is discussed. The chapter defines profiling as the "process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristic's based on crime scenes and other evidence. When profiling evidence is trying to be collected a profiler will analyze crime scenes, gather victim information from friends, family, co-workers etc., study police and autopsy reports. The chapter also mentions that there is only about a dozen agents are considered to be profilers. This really went against what I believed to be true. Possibly because of all the media portrayal and crime shows that always have a "profiler" on staff. I laughed when I read this because I thought, well the show Criminal Minds basically has them all. After reading this I knew the rest of the chapter would be surprising and informative because my beliefs had already been "debunked".

The chapter then went on to discuss some of the aspects that went into profiling and universal characteristics profiling has brought about. For instance most serial killers (murders who kill 3 or more people in separate events with cooling off periods in between murders) will have signatures. The book defines signature as distinctive, personal aspect of crime that presumably reveals the personality of a killer. A lot of this signature is based on the judgement of the profiler. This is why the art of profiling is not always seen as legitimate evidence, because much of the "profile" is rather subjective. I never really thought about it that way. This meaning, that there really is a scientific backing or research to creating a profile. I became even more surprised after reading the three famous profile cases, and the one in particular about the Olympic bomber. The perpetrator profile of the bomber (single white male, middle class, liked things surrounding police and FBI work) led police to Mr. Jewell who was a security guard where the Olympics took place. Well, the police turned out to be wrong and the real bomber was not found until 8 years later (Eric Rudolph).

Though profiling has not always proven to be correct, profiling has been able to bring some insight on the characteristics of serial killers. Most serial killers have patterns, most have also experienced physical, sexual, or psychological child abuse. In addition, most all are white and of average intelligence, they seek domination, and usually have a "type" when it comes to victim selection, torture, and also usually show obsessive interest.

Murderers can also be placed into categories. These category consist of organized killers which are killers who "carefully select and stalk their victims and also plan out what they do to their victims". These type of killers will also show much patience and self control. The other category is disorganized killers who are impulsive, picks victims at random, acting on sudden rage or following command to kill from voices in head. Richard Holmes went on to describe even more detailed categories. These were separated into 4 different types. The first is visionary types which are usually people who are psychotic, who have visions or believes they hear voices from god or spirits which instruct to kill. Another category is Mission-Oriented, which are killers who are motivated by kill people who they see as evil or unworthy. The third is the Hedonistic Types which kill for thrills and take sadistic sexual pleasure in the torture of their victims. Finally, there is the Power-Oriented types who find satisfaction from capturing and controlling the victim before killing. All of these categories offer some insight.

Profiling has many problems especially when it come to data validity. There are also problems when it comes to "tunnel vision" because some profilers will only look for what the police and public want. In the chapter it tells us that of the 27% of published articles on profiling only 5% acknowledge the theoretical issues of profiling. Again, this can be due to biasness and tunnel vision. Profiling must be determined if it is probative evidence. This is when evidence provides information about whether or not the person committed the crime.

Since profiling always be used or really seen as a science, the chapter offers other alternatives when it comes to finding out more about the murder. Of these include geographic profiling an psychological autopsy. Geographic profiling, which relies on maps and math when it comes to finding criminals, reminded me a lot of the show Numbers. These provide more accurate, direct implications. I wanted to know more about how geographic profiling is used in cases.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/maps/gp.htm
This link gives more information about the history and effectiveness of geographic profiling. It also gives information about the software used which include Rigel, CrimeStat, and Dragnet.

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/profiling/geographic/3.html
This site gives examples of cases that used geographic profiling. Of these include the case of Rafael Resendez- Ramirez who was known as the train track killer, and how he was found using geographic profiling.

Psychological autopsy was also rather interesting because it looked more at the victim's history which seems like it would be effective. All in all, trying to track down a criminal according to evidence that can be rather subjective is a dangerous game, but when applied correctly can prove to be rather effective.

This chapter was all about criminal profiling: what it is exactly, what is determined, what is looked at etc. Criminal profilers are highly educated in personality and behavioral psychology due to the fact that they are determing the personality and behavior of the killer, without even knowing them. They are looking at what they are seeing and determining what kind of person they're dealing with solely based on the type of crime, where it took place, what the crime scene looks like, the victims race and their injury, etc.
The movie, Silence of the Lambs, was mentioned in the beginning due to the fact that this movie made profiling quite popular in murder-like movies. Profiling gives you an insight to the perpatrator's race, gender, age, education, work, hobbies, socioeconomic status, etc. just by looking at the crime scene and finding out if there's a signature or same motive to the crimes taking place. There are not many around that are perfectly trained in this occupation and I believe it truly takes a lot of skill and knowledge to be a profiler.
The chapter continued on talking about famous profilers around and three profiles to highly publicized crimes, Jack the ripper, the olympic bomber and the mad bomber. The files are merely just an aspect of looking at the killer, that are applied to solving the crimes, they don't solve the crimes themselves. I was surprised to learn that trained profilers are usually used for serial killers and not all major crimes. Though, looking at the fact that they don't solve or even point in the right direction of 'who' the perp. is, it's understandable.
Something of interest that I would like to learn more about are organized vs. disorganized crime scenes. It would probably be easy to know if it was disorganized if it looked like a tornado had just hit, but what it the perp looked for a place like that to throw investigators off? How are they able to determine that? It just seems like this should be the research investigators should be doing in the first place to solve the crime, that there shouldn't just be a special experience professional for doing this. http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-criminal-profiling.htm
Also it's crime scene's like this that leave you hanging. http://gawker.com/#!5358699/yale-crime-scene A 24-year-old Yale student that had gone missing, and was later found in the walls of a lab she worked at. The profiler wouldn't have been able to do much, because there were absolutely no leads. Overall, I just don't think the job should be limited.

This chapter started out in an intersting way. Probably because Silence of the Lambs is one of my favorite movies. Its about a women who uses social profiling to catch a serial killer. But the book showed me that there were a lot of inconsitencies with the movie which was actually really surprising to me. Most profiling is very broad and can often cause detectives to form tunnel vision and not see the case as one big picture. They start looking for certain aspects about the perp that may or may not be true. At some points even the profilers are not always confident with their profiles. The text also discussed how profiling was also used long ago such as in cases like Jake the Ripper and the Mad Bomber which we also read about for today in Minds on Trail.
The chapter also talked about different types of profiling such as geographic profiling. This is when they would use data from crimes, punch numbers and use it to plan where and when the person may strike next. I am learning some of this in my crime analysis class but that is for another day.
Another thing mentioned in the chapter was signiture. This is defined as a distinctive, personal aspect of the crime that reveals personality of the killer. This could be several different characteristics such as keeping trophies or canibalism. Or even the example in the Silence of the Lambs when Buffalo Bill would put a cacoon in the victims throat.
While some believe profiling is important and others find it useless im still on the fence about my decision becuase in some cases it seems helpful but in other cases some of the techniques lead detectives astray.
http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/00206/nts_psychological_profiling.htm

Chapter 5 discusses Criminal Profiling and Psychological Autopsies. It defines profiling as the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence. It mentions several famous profiles including Jack the Ripper who murdered several prostitutes in London, Eric Rudolph who set off a bomb during the 1996 olympics, and George Metensky who bombed various locations in New. After going through the stories of those three criminals, the chapter describes some characteristics generally true of serial killers in America. Nearly all serial killers are white males and are typically of average intelligence. Most seek to dominate their victims before killing them. They tend not to kill using guns, preferring more intimate methods such as strangulation, stabbing, or even torture. Most victims of serial killers are of a certain type and serial killings are often highly sexualized crimes. It separates the criminals into organized and disorganized and discusses common characteristics of both. Psychology relates to the development of profiles because they are developed using inferences based upon characteristics of previous offenders committing similar crimes. A profiler has to use evidence alone in determining a profile especially any written or vocal evidence to help determine symptoms of possible mental illness.
Problems occur with developing profiles, one being Cross Situational Consistency. Police need to be very careful in determining the consistency of the behavior of an individual criminal across crimes. While research indicates that our basic personalities remain stable over time, our behavior is also powerfully determined by the situation. So, a person can't be sure of the personality of a criminal based on one circumstance alone. Another problem coming from profiles is tunnel vision in which police focus on one profile, and ignore all possible others. Profiling continues to be a pseudoscientific technique and the president of the Academy of Behavioral Profiling had this to say about profiling: "The reality is that no research or substantial evidence exists to confirm the validity of one type of profiling over another or one specific educational experience over another...the field of criminal profiling has seen little significant advancement." The end of the chapter talks about psychological autopsies. These have to be done with an equivocal death or one where the cause of death is unknown. Researchers developed a 16 issue checklist to assist psychologists with determining cod.
I've never really looked into profiling so everything I learned surprised me. I thought the judicial system had more faith in profiles than it does as it was heavily criticized in the chapter. I was also surprised at how easily some profiles were developed with such little known information.
I wanted to know more about psychological autopsy. It seems like it would be very hard to determine the exact cause of death using psychological autopsy and even harder to try and present that autopsy in court. I tried to find more information on the Tina Mancini case but there wasn't a lot of information so I just researched psychological autopsies in general.
http://www.deathreference.com/A-Bi/Autopsy-Psychological.html
http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10337.aspx
A lot of the information was interesting but the most interesting being that suicide rates for adolescents has increased over the past 4 decades. Determining suicide from murder seems very difficult and controversial but if no one was around to witness a crime and the symptoms of suicide seem present what else can we do?

Chapter 5 starts off by explaining profiling, which is using inferences about a criminal’s personality. A person who’s only job is profiling is a rarity and the it is most common to use profiling when dealing with serial killers. This makes sense because you can compare evidence from crime scenes and almost get to know the killer from his actions. Creating a profile essentially helps the police know what to look for, not always exactly who to look for. Profilers will often look for “signatures” or repetitive clues from scene to scene. A signature can be a clue as to WHY the killer does what he does to. If they dispose of the body in a certain matter, it may show disrespect, which would be another clue to the killer’s personality.
The chapter moves on to discuss 3 famous profiles. First, Jack the Ripper who was considered the first profiled criminal. Some of the key notes the profiler made were about his strength and his daring side. He was also predicted to lack a consistent occupation because of his eccentric killings. Yet he was never captured so whether these are true or not is still unknown. The next profile focus is on “The Olympic Bomber” which involved a bomb explosion at the 1996 Summer Olympics. The information released about evidence discovered led the police to investigate a guard named Richard Jewel. Yet, 3 months later they admitted they had no evidence to link Jewel to the crime. But the damage to his reputation had been complete and was irreversible. Eventually, Eric Rudolph was arrested in connection with the crime. Finally, they look into the “Mad Bomber.” Which is ultimately one of the most famous profile cases. As we discussed in class, a disgruntled employ inevitably seeks revenge on a company that refused to pay his medical bills for an injury that happened while working. Over 16 years, he plants over 30 bombs and leaves numerous notes leading police on their investigation. He drops clues such as where he worked and why he is upset. When the profiler recognizes these and looks into the company’s history, he seeks out George Metesky. Shockingly, earlier statements made by the profiler match to Metesky but in a sense, some are vague details.
Next, the chapter looks into the characteristics of serial killers. Most are irrational thinkers, some of which are results of brain injuries, some are abused during childhood, and most seek to dominate their victim before killing them. One distinction between killers is whether they are organized or disorganized. An organized planner is careful and sometimes more elaborate with their killings while disorganized killers are impulsive and picking random victims. But to claim killers will either be organized or not is too simplistic of a concept to be true. When looking at the characteristics of killers, psychology plays a huge role. If we know why certain people commit certain crimes, we can make inferences from them. A serial killer will usually leave clues behind, but sometimes they are more of a psychological investigation to break down rather than DNA or something more straightforward.
The issue of bias or tunnel vision comes into play when we start stereotyping or using inaccurate information. Simply saying, if we are giving information to look for a white, 30 year old male, we tend to only look for them because we BELIEVE in the information we have received, but what happens when it is wrong?
The chapter next discusses geographic profiling, which relies more on mapping. This usually uses a computer system which compiles all known evidence to give a map of predicted locations of the killers. This is what I chose to learn more about because it seems like a good and logically solution. This idea runs off the stereotype you see in the movies where investigators have their huge map of the county with different colored pins marking certain crimes, but in a more sophisticated way. The first computer run profiling system was in 1995, in Vancouver. But the idea has spread quickly and even is sometimes used for other crimes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographic_profiling

Investigating a crime is a difficult task and many methods, resources, or tools may be used to do so. In some cases, profilers are employed to create deductions regarding a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics. They are said to provide leads for the police and help investigators narrow their work. To do so, profilers are granted access to crime scenes, evidence and police reports. In most instances, profiles are generally created for serial rapists or killers. The profile of the serial killer will help police/detectives understand why the killer has committed the crime at hand. Profilers have found several ways to classify serial killers.

Serial killers are not all alike, however, they display common characteristics including but not limited to: white, male, history of sexual abuse, specific victim selectivity. Along with these characteristics profilers can place serial killers into several categories based on evidence. They may be classified as either Organized or disorganized killers, or they will be described as “visionaries”, “mission-oriented”, “power-oriented”, or “hedonistic”.

Profiling has been glamorized by movies and books that end with the perpetrator being caught based on a correct profile. However, in reality, profiles can cause police and detectives to look for the wrong ‘type’ of person, or be obsessed with looking for a certain ‘type’ of person, known as “tunnel vision”. Also, psychological profiling is mainly based on the profiler’s instinct, and assumptions about evidence presented to him/her. Statements made from profiles can be contradictory, broad, and open to interpretation. Criminal profiles are not credible sources of information.

Along with criminal profiling, there are other techniques used to help aide investigations. One other technique is known as geographic profiling. In geographic profiling, computers generate maps or spatial areas using crime scene locations, body dump sites, and areas where witnesses saw suspicious activity. These geographic profiles estimate in what vicinity the killer lives or may be found. Unlike psychological profiling, geographic profiling provides direct propositions for investigators. Using this type of profiling, patterns of movement by the criminal may be tracked, which may create substantial leads. Another technique used to investigate crimes by using profiles is Psychological Autopsies. These autopsies help classify a death as: “natural, accidental, suicide, or homicide.” If a death does not fit into a category it is seen as an equivocal
death, where causes are unknown.

In this chapter I was most surprised by the three myths regarding “psychopaths”. 1. Most psychopaths are not violent. 2. Psychopaths are almost always rational. 3. Psychopaths may benefit from psychological treatment much like a non-psychopath may. * I had believed all the myths before reading this chapter. It made me realized how criminal profiles can be interpreted differently or incorrectly by many people. All people come prepared to use their own intuitive ideas to create their own profiles about certain ‘types’ of people and what certain behaviors or clues may represent. The variability of profiles makes their validity questionable.

I wanted to know if Psychological Criminal profiling had grown with the technological advancements of the 21st century. The following article shows how profiling is used to describe 'typical' cyber criminals. http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/security/profiling-and-categorizing-cybercriminals/4069

Chapter 5 in the C&K booked starts off by recapping a scene from the movie Silence of the Lambs, where Agent Starling is looking at crime scene photographs and giving a profile of who the serial killer is, by looking at the nature of his crimes committed against women. The profile she gave a description of a “white male, with his own place, in his 30’s or 40’s, he’s cautious, precise, and never impulsive, and will never stop,” which actually turns out be right on description of the killer named Buffalo Bill in the film. The chapter also gets right into criminal profiling and process which the FBI takes to start their profile. They use criminal profiling a lot in serial killer’s cases, because they murder more than one person, use the same MO, and usually have a signature with their crimes. Also discussed was the profile of the Olympic Bomber, where the profile they gave was a description of that matched a man named Richard Jewell, his reputation was ruined because of FBI’s “case” against him, 3 months later they admitted they had the wrong person and had found new evidence against Eric Rudolph and captured in 2005. It also touched on graphic profiling, where they create a profile based on key locations associated with serial crimes, it has been proven to be useful in some case with serial killers. The section on psychological autopsies talked about equivocal death (not clear why someone died), the death classification NASH, how the psychological autopsies work, and the check list they use to determine if it’s a suicide when nothing is left behind to tell.
I found it surprising that profilers aren’t used in every case like it they make it seem in movies and on TV, and that their description can match more than one person and they can really make an innocent person go through a lot that is not necessary or even make a profile that doesn’t match their perp at all. The reading made me realize it’s not as cool or as easy as they make it out to be, not just anyone can be a profiler, and having it as a job is not really as common as it I thought before either, also that profilers aren’t always confident with their work. The section on geography profiling was interesting, because I didn’t really think it something used that much, but I understand how it can help them narrow the area where someone may live or where they may commit more crimes, but I’m glad it sheds light that they can make errors and it can be wrong, and really mess up the whole investigation. The section on autopsies was also interesting to me, especially with the check list they used to help determine if it was suicide or not, I didn’t know there was such thing they used, I always thought people might be in denial either way because sometimes there is not note, no signs, or anything left behind to be sure. The Jackson case was very disgusting to learn about how the daughter took her own life, because of how unhappy she was with what her mother was having her to do to make money for their family.
I decided to research on the Jackson vs . State of Florida case, because I found it disgusting and am curious to see the outcome and details of the case. The mom was found guilty of “child abuse, forgery, and procuring a sexual performance by a child.” She was only sentenced to a year in jail, but remained free on bail during her appeal. I cannot believe that is all she got for what she did to her daughter and what her actions lead her daughter to taking her own life. One of the articles I read was about the money that would be received by the family for earnings of a possible book and movie deal; after the she was sentenced all she was worried about is how much money she was going to get for her and her family.
http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1989-03-03/news/8901120468_1_child-abuse-hearing-earnings

Chapter 5 deals with the phenomena of criminal profiling. Criminal profiling is the process of determining the criminal’s behavior, personality, demographics, and motivation by analyzing the crime scene, crime, evidence, and offender victimology. The chapter begins by discussing the movie “The Silence of the Lambs”. This movie is about an FBI trainee, Clarice Starling, who is invited into the task of catching a serial killer, better known as Buffalo Bill. She uses the evidence they have, including photos, leads, etc., to create a criminal profile of the offender in order to learn about him and catch him. Her profile leads to the right man, showing that profiling is a useful tool in the FBI. One problem is that the movie is a movie; it is not real life, thus it can be inaccurate in several aspects. The chapter discusses that criminal profiling is actually not scientifically valid. It only provides an accurate description of the correct offender a very little percent of the time. Of the studies that were done, they could not validate profiling as a particularly reliable method for capturing offenders, particularly sexual offenders. Typically, profiling is used for cases of serial killers, but can and has been used for things like bombings. The case of George Metesky is an example of a criminal psychiatrist creating a profile of the bomber based on different aspects of the crime and using statistical inferences. Metesky was better known as the Mad Bomber. He placed bombs throughout New York City from 1940-1956. Dr. Brussel was a criminal psychiatrist that was asked to help in the case and developed characteristics of the criminal to help catch him. He turned out to be pretty accurate which led to profiling being seen as a serious and helpful tool for criminal investigators. An interesting note in the Metesky case is that the profile developed by Dr. Brussel led the investigators to use much of their time and resources interrogating innocent men simply because they “fit” the profile. This is one problem that occurs with a tool that is not based on sound research. As mentioned, research shows that profiling leads to identification of the offender in only about 2.7% of the cases. This is very surprising, because the media makes it seem like it is much more prolific than it is. The chapter discusses thoroughly how inaccurate profiling can be and points out the fact that there has been few research studies conducted to investigate profiling as a science. One interesting fact is that trained profilers were not the best people to predict certain aspects of the crime. While they have the most training in the area, they seemed to be the least likely to accurately describe the offender’s thought processes, social habits, and personal history. Generally, profilers’ accuracy was less than 50%, even though they were better than other groups in these areas. That is discerning. The most problematic area was serial rape. Studies have shown that there are no significant corresponding attributes across perpetrators of serial rape. They do not tend to have a pattern that will help decide who committed the rapes or why. This often leads, like I said, to investigation of the wrong person. The chapter discusses how these assumptions can cause problems because they are discredited by data. They describe how two characteristics are used to describe perpetrators and crime scenes, organized and disorganized. The organized type is typically controlled, planned, and calmly executed. The murderers in this category are typically seen as normal and are skilled and competent. The disorganized crimes are spontaneous, random, violent, and messy. These murderers usually are below average intelligence, unskilled, incompetent, and anxious. The problem with these two categories is that there is no clear line to separate them. Instead, they run along a continuum, and it is sometimes hard to distinguish which category they should be placed into. If you assume one category because a couple things fit it, you may look completely at a wrong person. There may be other factors that cause a disorganized person to commit an organized crime, such as mental illness, or vice versa. These types of assumptions can create tunnel vision. This is similar to the widening the net, however it works in reverse. This is where the actual perpetrator may go free because they do not have certain aspects of the profile. This leads investigators to exclude them from interrogation because they don’t “fit” the profile. This chapter also discusses one thing that helps with these problems.

The area of geographic profiling is an alternative to intuition based profiling. This is a computer program, sometimes known as criminal spatial mapping. This uses mathematics to plot where bodies have been dumped, where suspicious activities have been spotted, etc., to attempt to locate either where the perpetrator is, lives, or where they will attack next. This can help investigators know where to set traps, find witnesses, and place stakeouts. It has helped in cases where murderers have used highways or trains to get around and kill around. Investigators were able to see this on the maps and decide that they were using these as methods of transportation, thus capturing the offenders at points in the map that seem to be the anchor point, or point where attacks might be launched. This program is not perfect, however. It was used in the case of the Beltway Sniper. The program suggested that the killer would be living in Montgomery Country, Maryland because of the locations of the sniper attacks. The truth was that they were a man and a 17 year old boy who were transients and had no real home. They had been sleeping in their car at a highway rest stop. The program assumed a home base and made a profile from that.

The chapter talks about psychological autopsies as well. These are where investigators make an effort to examine the psychological state of the person prior to his or her death by looking at records left behind (letters, emails, journals, cell phones, etc.), talking to people they knew, and reconstructing their emotional state, personality, thoughts, and lifestyle. These are helpful in determining if an “accident” was truly that or if it was a suicide or murder. They typically have checklists to assist them. If the majority of items point to suicide that is what it is usually ruled, as long as the actual autopsy doesn’t show that they were shot from the other side of the room. These checklists have shown to be 92% accurate in distinguishing the correct type of death in research studies. Even though we have these tools, it is still hard to distinguish if someone killed themselves or accidentally died.

Another important thing the chapter discussed, and what I did more research on, was the types of profiling used. The book discusses the difference between the MO (Modus Operandi) and the signature of the offender. I think this is an important point to begin because these are discovered using a deductive technique to profiling. The MO is only the necessary components used to accomplish their task. This may be a killer using a car to transport a victim to a murder site or dump site. This is something that can change based on the time, place, situation, etc., of the crime. It can also change based on the growth of the actual criminal. As people grow older and possibly more experienced, they may become more organized and efficient in the way they commit crimes, thus changing their MO. Their signature, however, is something that does not typically change. Their signature is the extra things they do at the crime that make it “theirs”. It is their own personal touch that presumably reveals the personality of the killer. This may be their extra cutting of the victim, the way they do it, what they use, or if they take something or leave something behind. This is what usually allows investigators to connect crimes to each other, even if the MO is dramatically different. The technique used to discover these items is deductive profiling. This is the process of making inferences about a perpetrator’s personality, demographics, behavior, and motivations based on the actual crime scene, crime, forensic evidence, and offender’s victimology. Simply stated, you look at the crime scene and crime itself and deduce who, what, how, and why. This technique allows for change in the offender. It is the better approach of two in criminal profiling. It tends to be more accurate and one important factor is that this approach comes AFTER the investigation, not before, thus helping reduce the amount of bias that can lead the investigator to interrogate someone who may possibly be innocent or exclude the real killer. However, there are some downsides to using this technique. The first is that it is obviously very time consuming. It takes a lot of effort to complete and requires someone with skill in the area. It is not a quick fix. It also requires someone who is emotionally grounded and can easily discuss sensitive topics with those close to them. They cannot be someone who has a problem with these since it can be emotionally exhausting. Lastly, without knowing the signature, it is hard to say with confidence that this specific person committed this crime. You have to be able to determine the signature and analyze it appropriately. If these disadvantages can be dealt with, deductive profiling is definitely the better choice than the second technique, inductive profiling.
The inductive approach is a significantly less valid one. This is where you use generalized statistical statements based on other crimes and criminals studied in the past, and apply it to the individual criminal and crime at hand to determine who, how, and why. There are three datasets that are generally used for inductive profiling. The statistics may come from formal and informal studies of known criminal populations, practical experience recalled by the profiler, and public data sources including the media. One common example used in inductive profiling is saying that typically males commit a certain type of crime; therefore the perpetrator is a male. It is also used for race (also known as racial profiling, which is dangerous to pursue and very illegal), age, location, etc. It is obvious why this technique is often used to professionals. It is an easy and quick tool that helps distinguish who you should look for. You do not need special knowledge or training to utilize this tool. You only need to be able to find statistics and facts to support it. There are more problems than advantages, however. This information is generalized from a limited population sample, thus it is not specifically related to any one case and is not intended to identify an individual person. The sample may not be accurately representative of the larger population either. The biggest problem with this approach is the widening of the net. You can say that because males are most likely to commit this crime, aged 18-25, Caucasian, etc., John Smith might be the perpetrator. BUT, so might a LARGE population of people. It causes biases in the investigation and leads the investigators down specific roads. Because the net is wide, they waste much time and resources investigating people who are probably innocent, simply because they “fit” the profile. It also may exclude the real perpetrator if the profile is a few years off on age or wrong on sex and race. It also lacks empirical research. In fact, this type of profiling has been shown to be very unreliable and valid in the research that has been conducted. Often times, investigators unknowingly fit the evidence to the profile. As discussed above, studies have shown that there is not actually a set of characteristics shared by the majority or all of offenders that commit similar crimes. Each personality and experiences form a different crime with different aspects. The fact that inductive profiling doesn’t account for change largely hinders this techniques ability to accurately provide an insightful view of the criminal and their crime. I think that typically profilers tend to use both techniques together; however, I think that they try to find something that is quick and easy instead of taking the time necessary to look at every aspect. This could be a factor into why profiling is as useless as research tends to exhibit.
http://www.criminalprofiling.ch/article2.html

I think the psychological preference of the profiler is vital in these cases. The psychology of sensation and perception are the first and very important aspects of profiling. How the profiler is able to accurately sense details in the crime scene is of utmost importance. This is a big part of how they determine many of the characteristics of a profile. If they do not see certain details or sense them in any way, they could be missing a vital part of the investigation, and quite possibly the signature itself. How they perceive what they sense is also important. They may view something as not as important as another and not give it as much attention, when it may be the most important thing in the room. This could throw off their profile, leading the investigators in the wrong direction, and arrest someone who isn’t involved in the slightest. If they see something as very important and integral to the case, they will focus more attention on it and probably introduce that aspect into the profile.
The profiler’s take on psychology could also affect how they create a profile. If they are one that focuses on developmental psychology they will probably view the criminal differently than if they focus on biological psychology. If they view the crime in the eyes of a developmental psychologist, they will probably tend to show that in their profile by stating that certain aspects growing up have changed how the criminal thinks, feels, why they do what they do, and even how they will act. If they think that the offender shows signs that they have a disease or something affecting their behavior that will alter where they look for evidence and how they introduce that into the profile as well. This is why it is important for a profiler to ignore personal influences when looking at this information. They need to explore every option, not just the aspect they prefer. There are many possible causes and explanations to criminal behavior, and by focusing only on one, they may have tunnel vision and exclude the real criminal. Even though Dr. Brussel pretty accurately described George Metesky, he also based some of his characteristics on a very Freudist view of psychology. He claimed that the way Metesky wrote his W’s and slashed the bottom of theater seats indicated a very sexual nature of his crimes and that he had the Oedipal Complex, where he was in love with his mother and hated his father. This narrow view could have had important implications on catching the person if Metesky did not give certain details that led to his arrest.

Chapter five in C&K titled ‘Criminal Profiling and Psychological Autopsies’ opens up with discussing one of my favorite movies of all time The Silence of the Lambs. The movie brought the concept of criminal profiling to the general public. Profiling is a tool that law enforcement use to try to find and catch a criminal and it usually applied to catching serial killers specifically. Serial killers are murderers who kill three or more people at separate events with periods of rest in-between. Profiling is the process of drawing inferences about a criminal’s personality, behavior, motivation and demographic characteristics based on the crime scene, autopsy results and other evidence. Criminal profiling originated at the FBI in their Behavioral Science Unit in Quantico, Virginia. Profiling has been used all over the world but there are very few actual “profilers”, maybe only a dozen in the United States. Despite the popularity of profiling in the media it is a invalidated technique. In the media, profilers are depicted as having almost psychic abilities, but according to John Douglas (former FBI profiler who wrote the book Mind Hunter in which I’m doing my book report on) a good profiler needs to put himself in the mindset of the serial killer, which sounds pretty scary, no wonder there is not many profilers. It would be very difficult and not to mention horrifying to put yourself in the mindset of a serial killers such Ted Bundy or Jeffrey Dahmer. The chapter also mentions three famous murderers in which profiling were used. The first was Jack the Ripper where in 1888 Dr. Thomas Bond created what might very well be the first criminal profile. Jack the Ripper was a serial killer in London who strangled and slit the throats of at least five prostitutes. The murders were very public and very gruesome. Dr. Thomas Bond performed autopsies on at least two of the victims and created a criminal profile based on what he saw. Sadly, Jack the Ripper was never caught, so the validity of the profile that Dr. Thomas Bond created could not be evaluated. The second was the Olympic Bomber who bombed 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. The FBI gave the police a profile of a white, middle-class, male who was really interested in law enforcement. The police arrested Richard Jewell and in order to make people feel at ease at the Summer Olympics his name and picture appeared everywhere as proof to the general public that Olympic Bomber was caught. Unfortunately they had arrested the wrong guy, but the damage was done. Richard Jewell life was beyond repair. The FBI eventually arrested another man named Eric Rudolph. The third was the Mad Bomber which we read about in Minds on Trial and wrote about in a previous blog.
There are recurring patterns among serial killers but not a certain set of traits. Many suffer from some sort of brain injury and most have experienced some sort of childhood abuse. And a lot of people have heard that serial killers often are cruel toward animals during their childhood which is also a common pattern among serial killers. Most all serial killers are white males of average intelligence. Most do not used guns to kill their victims, but use more personable passionate methods such as strangulation and stabbing. They tend to have a particular type of victim for example Jeffrey Dahmer’s type was young Asian or African men.
There are organized killers and disorganized killers. Organized killers plan their crimes and disorganized killers do not.
Ronald Holmes found that serial killers could be grouped into four different types: visionary, mission-oriented, hedonistic and power-oriented. Visionary killers are psychotic and usually have visions or hear voices from a higher power telling he/she to kill certain people. Mission-oriented killers are not as likely to be psychotic but have a deep desire to kill anyone they feel is evil or unworthy. Hedonistic killers are murderers who kill for the thrill and for sexual gratification. They often torture their victims. Power-oriented killers like the control aspect of murdering someone. Not all serial killers fall into these categories and the categories can overlap.
There are many problems with profiling. It has not been validated and is not even accepted in court and eyewitness testimony is? It might be because profiling is such a new technique. Most crimes are not clearly disorganized or organized. Another problem with profiling is cross-situational consistency. People behave different in different situations. I know I act differently when I’m with my grandparents as opposed to when I am at a party with my friends. This is also true for crimes, the same murderer may have killed the people in different situations but because the different situations caused the murderer to change up his/her MO, the ensuing criminal profile made is of two different murderers and this could happened the other way where two crimes in two different situations look identical but were committed by two different people but had the same criminal profile. Another problem with profiling is that the profile that is created can have a lot of specific interpersonal traits on it that are not helpful at all for law enforcement to help catch the perpetrator. The book gave an example of the profile that three FBI profilers offered to the Wichita detectives in helping to solve the BTK killer murders. The list on the profile consisted of things like “immature sexual history”, “he drives a decent automobile, but it will be nondescript” and “he can function in social settings, but only on the surface”. All of these traits are either really vague or can never be observed or proven. Another problem with profiling is that tunnel vision can happen as a result. A lot of profiles can be misleading. A profile that is too specific could potentially eliminate the actual perpetrator causing law enforcement to ignore certain evidence and only focusing on evidence that fits the profile.
Chapter five also discusses geographic profiling aka criminal spatial mapping and is an alternative to intuitive profiling. Geographic profiling relies on maps and mathematics. The locations of a crime can be very important and can help predict where the next crime by the culprit may take place. This can help law enforcement set traps or develop stake-outs. I would like to learn more about how geographic profiling is done.
Psychological autopsies were also discussed toward the end of chapter five in C&K. Psychological autopsies are done with the cause of death is not certain. It is done to try to get inside the mind of know what psychological state the victim was in when he or she dies. I would also like to learn more about psychological autopsies.
Nothing in this chapter was too surprising. A lot of people seemed to be surprised that the actual number of profilers in our country is so low, but that is just because the media portray it to be a more popular job.
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/maps/gp.htm
This website went over some of the history of geographic profiling and also discussed some computer programs that are used in geographic profiling.
http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/forensics/psych_autopsy/index.html
This link provided information about psychological autopsies. It went more into depth about some of the same things covered in the book and in class. It is very difficult sometimes to determine whether a death was an accident, a suicide, or a homicide.

Chapter 5 in the C&K textbook was about profiling and psychological autopsies. This chapter discussed first the basic process and a few examples of profiling. According to the textbook, profiling is defined as "the process of drawing inferences about a criminal's personality, behavior, motivation, and demographic characteristics based on crime scenes and other evidence." (page 97) Brief history about profiling and descriptions of different cases that used early profiling techniques are then given. The book then uses these descriptions of profiling to give the examples of different types of serial killers. These two main types are organized and disorganized. Part of profiling is to analyze the crime scene and determine the type of crime committed and who the perpetrator might be. For example, the book gives a table that states that an organized crime scene is often from a planned crime. Furthermore, a criminal who commits a planned crime may be have an intelligence level of at least average.

The book then goes on to discuss common myths and problems of profiling. For instance, a profile may match a large population of people. If a profiler determines that the criminal is likely someone who owns their own home, that does not narrow down the search by very much, considering that there may be thousands of people in the area who are homeowners. A myth about profiling is that it is very reliable and will lead the investigators to the criminal. As discussed in the book and class, this is far from true. Rather, profiling is simply a tool used by investigators to help understand who the perpetrator might be. Another problem with profiling is that it limits the expectations of the investigators. If they are searching for only people that fit the profile, they may miss the actual criminal, due to the fact that the profile is simply an estimate, not a correct answer.

Other types of profiling, such as geographic profiling and psychological autopsies are discussed. Geographic profiling is more scientific because it relies on facts. Areas where crime scenes occurred (in cases where a criminal commits multiple acts) and other areas of interest are placed on a map. Calculations are then made about where this perpetrator is likely to reside. On the contrary, psychological autopsies are not based on facts. They revolve around examining qualities of the victim's life, with the hopes that understanding the victim's life will help to be able to better understand the circumstances surrounding their death. This is one area that I find incredibly interesting. Reading about psychological autopsies for me was also surprising. I knew that some of these techniques existed, but I thought they were simply part of crime investigation procedure. I did not know that they were an entirely separate area of profiling.

In doing a bit of research on psychological autopsies, I learned that they are often performed in equivocal cases of death in which suicide is a possibility. This may include deaths that seem to be accidents, but could be suicidal; or it also may include deaths that seem to be suicide, but could in fact be homicide. When investigating these types of deaths, it becomes crucial to identify the victim's life. One thing that is examined is their interpersonal relationships. Suicidal individuals will often sort of "let go" of their lives. They will begin saying goodbyes to families and friends, or detaching themselves from these areas of life. They also may have more recent views and ideas on death and dying. However, in cases that may be homicide, death will come as a shock to friends and family members of the victim. They will state that the victim enjoyed life, was happy, and never gave any hints that they were having difficulties.
http://www.angelfire.com/ga4/suicideawareness/18.html

Before reading this chapter, I did not place much of my own personal faith in profiling. I agreed with the concepts that are discussed in the chapter. I thought it would be helpful to some degree, but could not be reliable for solving the case alone. My ideas that profiling is simply a tool used by hard-working and intelligent investigators that solve the case were reinforced by class lecture and this chapter.

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