Four Main Approaches to Criminal Profiling: Characteristics of the Crime Scene - Research Paper Example

Criminal Profiling in Criminal Investigation al affiliation Forensic psychologists often apply psychology theory in order to investigate behavior of criminals and find motives which make them commit crimes. There is an assumption that the criminal’s behavior is always based on their personality and mannerism in general. Criminal profiling, in turn, may be defined as an investigative tool used in order to define characteristics and predict behavior of an unknown offender. Criminal profiling is often criticized as it has no scientific basis. Skeptics insist that criminal profiling cannot be regarded a solid and reliable technique since it does not have standard research methods. As a result, the success of the procedure usually depends on personal experience of a profiler. Very often, profilers fail to perform better than ordinary people. Nevertheless, criminal profiling should definitely be practiced and enhanced. This technique is quite useful in the course of investigation of violent crimes, such as sexual assault, sexual murders, arson, and so on. At the same time, criminal profiling should never be used as the primary means. This is just one of many tools which may be used to assist investigation. Key words: forensic psychology, criminal profiling, behavior, investigation. Criminal Profiling in Criminal Investigation Although criminal profiling, also known as offender profiling, is a comparatively new law enforcement technique, it turned to be quite effective in the course of criminal investigations. This is one of the means used in order to detect and capture criminals. It helps investigators predict and profile the characteristics of an unknown criminal subject or offender (Kocsis, 2009). In other words, this is a means to predict the behaviour of a criminal. Nevertheless, sceptics insist that criminal profiling has no scientific base, and therefore, should not be treated seriously. The truth seems to be somewhere in the middle. Criminal profiling should certainly be practiced since statistics proved it to be effective. At the same time, it should always remain only a supplementary method. An investigator should remember that criminal profiling still remains an unreliable source of information. Construction of a profile is usually one of the issues of concern of criminal psychology or, more generally, forensic psychology. When involved in criminal profiling, psychologists apply psychology theory in order to identify motives and create a profile of an offender. Criminal profiling is based on the idea that every criminal acts in accordance with their personal set of values, usually referred to as signatures. There is an opinion that an offender’s signature is as individual as a person’s handwritten signature. To identify an offender’s signature often means to help an investigator make a positive identification (Claridge, 2015). Thus, criminal profiling is based on an assumption that an offender’s behavior is guided by their personality and mannerism in general, no matter how severe the crime is. Despite skeptics, FBI acknowledges and widely uses criminal profiling. Although there is a number of models of profiling procedures, the one elaborated by John E. Douglas, a former special FBI agent and one of the first criminal profilers, seems to be the most detailed and thorough. According to this model (Douglas et al, 1986), profiling procedures may be categorized into six stages: 1. The first stage is known as input. On this stage, the task of a profiler is to collect information and evidences of the crime scene and the victim. This information is crucially important as it is the basis of further construction of a profile of an unknown criminal. 2. Decision process is the second stage. All the evidences should be categorized into patterns, which may help an investigator predict an offender’s behavior in future. It is necessary to examine the type of a victim and understand how much time the criminal needed in order to commit the crime. This is also important to know the level of risk the criminal has taken. All these evidences help profilers understand whether the offender commits the crime for the first time. 3. The next step is crime assessment. Profiler tries to reconstruct the crime scene in order to understand the criminal’s motives. It is necessary to evaluate evidences which were found at the scene of a crime. When assessed, these evidences should be related to behavioural patterns and personality attributes of those criminals who demonstrated similar traits as far as other criminal cases are concerned. 4. After this, profiler tries to summarize all the similarities and construct a description, or a profile. The formation of a criminal profile is the fourth stage and that is what an investigator is supposed to look for when dealing with a person under suspicion. A profile is supposed to contain an offender’s physical and demographic characteristics, and provide an outline of their presumable values and beliefs. 5. Investigation, the fifth stage, means that the profile should be forwarded to the crime investigator and be used as one of the investigative tools. 6. Finally, apprehension, the last step. The profile is supposed to be checked in case new evidences are uncovered. Nevertheless, this is wrong to assume that criminal profiling is a simple process. This is quite a complicated procedure, which may be viewed from different perspectives. Psychologists generally distinguish four main approaches to criminal profiling (Sammons, 2013). First of all, this is geographical approach – its main purpose is to identify where the criminal lives and works, that is why location and timing of the crime scene are especially important. Another approach, the typological one, aims to define specific characteristics of the crime scene and categorize the criminal in accordance to a number of special characteristics (Sammons, 2013). One more approach draws attention to the application of psychological theories. The main idea is to determine special characteristics of a criminal by looking at their peculiar behavior and style of the crime (Sammons, 2013). Finally, clinical approach. The task of a profiler is to determine whether the criminal suffers any mental disorders. For this purpose, the profiler resorts to the field of psychiatry and clinical psychology. When talking about criminal profiling, it is necessary to mention psychological autopsy, which is often referred to as its core component (Turvey, 2002). This may be defined as a thorough examination of the mental state of a victim. Its main purpose is to help investigators determine the nature of death, as it is often unclear whether death is a result of suicide, murder, accident, or natural causes. It is possible to define two basic applications of psychological autopsy. These are suicide psychological autopsy (SPA) and equivocal death psychological autopsy (EDPA) (Fulero & Wrightsman, 2009). SPA aims to understand motives which led to the suicide. The key task is to develop measures of crisis intervention and suicide prevention. EDPA is applied in case the mode of death is not immediately clear. According to different estimations, from 5% to 20% of deaths are equivocal. Therefore, EDPA may be seen as a form of crime investigation which focuses on alternative manners of deaths (Turvey, 2002). The key idea is to uncover new, unnoticed details which surround the death. Providing quite an extensive number of details concerning mental status and personality of a victim, psychological autopsy may be quite useful for a profiler. A lot of investigators, however, doubt the validity of psychological autopsy. There are no systematic guidelines as far as training and best practice are concerned. What is more, there is no accurate term for psychological autopsy. Although this technique is sometimes truly effective, this is only one of many tools which may be applied in the course of investigation of a criminal case. Profilers are also interested in victimology, the study of victims of those crimes which were committed by the same criminals. Victimology looks for similarities between all the victims of an offender, which helps profiler determine the pattern in the offender’s approach towards their crimes (Claridge, 2015). In victimology, attention is focused on the victims’ age, lifestyle, hair color and eye color. It is important to know whether victims met in the past. This information may help profilers create an accurate description of the offender. Although criminal profiling is quite a widely used technique, its validity is often doubted. Its opponents insist that criminal profiling lacks research standards and proper methodology. What is more, they are unlikely to be developed since each case and criminal are unpredictable and special in their own way. Criminal profiling may sometimes yield no results because of profilers themselves. The success usually depends on personal experience of a profiler, but not on scientifically proven methods. It is possible to say that the nature of profile construction is rather subjective. Profilers sometimes happen to make mistakes which may bring suspicion on an innocent person. There is even an opinion that trained profilers are sometimes not better at predicting actions of an offender than ordinary people. In summary, criminal psychology is most likely to be considered a pseudoscientific technique until empirical evidences prove its scientific validity. This is also wrong to think that profiling may be applied at any type of crime. In fact, it is useful only in case incidents are repeated. Thus, it may be used when investigating cases of rapists, sexual murders, arson, serial bombings, and so on. A profile itself hardly ever leads investigators to the criminal. In most cases, it may only help the police find the right direction in the course of investigation. It also helps investigators understand the crime and personality of the criminal better. Thus, criminal profiling may be quite effective, though not always. In some cases, however, it is effective indeed. A case of double murder of Gaetano and Maria Russo, committed in 1998, may be a good example (Turvey, 2000). The couple was found dead in their home. Both were brutally beaten. Having examined all the case materials, profilers made a conclusion that the the scene had been staged. Finally, the police arrested the victims’ son, Joseph, who was subsequently sentenced to 28 years. That is the example of the case when profiling happened to be especially useful. It should not be forgotten, however, that criminal profiling may sometimes have no effect at all. Ultimately, criminal profiling should definitely be used in the course of criminal investigations, even though it cannot be applied in all types of crime. Criminal profiling may be quite effective in solving violent crimes, though it may sometimes be totally useless. This technique should still be practiced even though it may sometimes slow down the investigation, in case the profiler is unexperienced. At the same time, it should never be used as the primary means. Criminal profiling has no scientific basis, and therefore, cannot be treated as a valid, accurate, and reliable tool. At the same time, it seems to have much potential in helping investigate crimes. Thus, criminal profiling definitely requires further advancements and development, especially as far as its theoretical base is concerned. It is necessary to develop standard research methods and prove that criminal profiling may be effective above the level of chance. References Douglas, J. E., Ressler, R. K., Burgess, A. W., & Hartman, C. R. (1986). Criminal profiling from crime scene analysis. Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 4, 401-421. Jack Claridge. Criminal Profiling & Its Use in Crime Solving. Explore Forensics. Retrieved Apr. 28, 2015, from www.exploreforensics.co.uk/criminal-profiling-and-its-use-in-crime-solving.html. Richard N. Kocsis (2009). Applied criminal psychology: a guide to forensic behavioral sciences. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas Publisher, p. 226. Sammons, A. In What is Offender Profiling? (chap. Criminal Psychology) Retrieved Apr. 13, 2013, from www.psychlotron.org.uk/newResources/criminological/A2_AQB_crim_whatIsProfiling.pdf Solomon Fulero, & Lawrence Wrightsman (2009). Forensic Psychology (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, p. 420. Turvey B. (2000). Staged Crime Scenes: A Preliminary Study of 25 Cases. Journal of Behavioral Profiling, 1(3). Turvey, B. (2002). Criminal Profiling – An introduction to behavioral evidence analysis. Elsevier Academic Press. Read More