Psychology -life and fanfic.

CRIMINAL PROFILE in serial killers (1)

Criminal profile - part 1

Viết bởi Sher.

DO NOT TAKEOUT!

Stands behind the foggy weather of winter a noiseless yet gloomy cage-like cell in the isolating Tennessee courthouse, where Dr. Hannibal Lecter delivered his famous speech: "a census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti", making him the most notorious villain of all the time. With its first yet outstanding production in the twentieth century, "Silence of the lamb" paved the way for a new era of crime horror movies. Among its inspirational aspects, the role of criminal profile in aiding investigation, has perhaps attracted the most attention, even up until this moment. Therefore, modern and widely popular crime-horror series such as Criminal Minds and SCI, are not outsiders from the trend. As our digitalized era offers screenwriters and moviemakers more opportunities, they not only insert completely characteristics of a criminal profile into but also innovate. The enhancement in later production then satisfies a thirst for "thrillers" but at the same time, brings up new problems. One issue would be that: depiction of this investigative approach is so "miraculous" and "fascinating" that thousands of young people find it unbelievably difficult in real life. Thus, it is a noteworthy enough for our mass media to evaluate the "logic and trustworthiness" behind those fictional works in terms of creativity. In other words, I strongly believe that a research in appraising the media portrayal of criminal profile versus the reality of profiling is beneficial due to two reasons: its prevention of misleading career outlook and its practical solutions for movie producers to address their fictional details appropriately.

Criminal profile is a method in criminal investigation and is typically used in such cases as serial murder, sexual assault, and arson. The method aims to limit the "scope" of an investigation. It helps identify an unknown offender's likely personality, background information in a much persuasive and objective way.

During 1956, a watershed event led by the 'Mad Bomber of New York' started to catching the police's attention. Dr James Brussel assisted the investigation by using the strategy of criminal profile. He used his expertise in forensic psychiatry to give the police much critical details of an unknown offender. In his book called "Casebook of a Crime Psychiatrist", Dr Brussel confessed to having reasoned critically, inferring possible background information of an unknown offender from criminal behaviors of his "patients". As George Metesky's case laid the foundation of criminal profile, the approach has been developed through times. During the 1980s, FBI established the Behavioral Science Unit (BSU) and they started applying the new method to work in serial murders cases. However, it was not until 1992 that the FBI offered a special training program with certification for police called "Criminal Investigative Analysis Fellowship" (CIAF). After 1992, the FBI began recruiting on non-FBI members from law enforcement agencies, to work specifically for the "criminal profiling" part of the whole crime investigation process. Surprisingly in April 1980, same year with the Behavioral Science Unit foundation, Roy Hazelwood and John Douglas published "The Lust Murderer" in the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. They presented for the first time in their article an idea to classify offenders, with regard to their staging behavior. In particular, they suggested that remnants at the crime scene arouse "something" about offenders. From the vast population of incarcerated sexual offenders and of other crimes, the FBI generate their hypothesis of categorization, based on general personality, demographic and crime scene characteristic (Burgess et al, 1986). In conclusion, they found two types of offenders, which are organized versus disorganized.

According to "Crime Classification Manual" organized offenders express a strong indignation towards victims and they seem to conduct their wrongdoings meticulously. They torture, mutilate victims to death and then enshroud their evil scheme by disposing, cutting into pieces or even cannibalizing, hoarding those bodies. These killers are completely aware of their misdeed and of their impact on the society. However, as they are wickedly intelligent and are lack of empathy, these organized offenders challenge the justice system by forcing it into a hide and seek game. The famous Ted Bundy serial killer is an exemplar for this type offender. Briefly, Ted Bundy sexually assaulted, tormented them by biting, stabbing or destructively sadistic rituals. Ted Bundy was deemed extremely cunning due to his destruction of criminal traces and to the vast amount of victims. It is also significant of him, to "believe" that no one would notice him and to fantasize America as a place where people are invisible except to themselves.

In contrast, disorganized offenders seem to be more precipitate. In other words, they prey on their victims randomly because they are less cunning than compared to organized offenders. However, this difference does not mean that these offenders are less barbarous. Instead, they might attack victims and gain control over them from a close distance because they feel safer and less difficult to perform criminal acts. According to criminologist Vronsky, disorganized offenders tend to struggle with his relationship in the society and there is a higher chance that these offenders are alone, unemployed. Thus the impediment in their interpersonal communication results in disarrangement at the crime scene. Furthermore, most disorganized offenders tend not to hide bodies and they might leave behind biological evidences such as their semen, bloodstain or samples of hair. Miguel Rivera exemplifies criterion of a disorganized serial killers by abruptly attacked several young boys in an East Harlem building in New York between March 1972 and August 1973. His first victim died after a thirty-eight stab wounds in the body with clear signs of sodomization. Other boys were abandoned in basements and on the rooftop of the building. They were stabbed to death and had their genitals cut off.

Criminal profile is a common approach that has been widely used in nowadays crime fiction, series, and in crime reality shows. The increasing views of people towards these shows, however, causes both advantages and disadvantages. In this research, however, I focus on presenting and explaining some misconception held by the mass media and its audience, for couples of reasons. Satiated with "over-imaginary" products of the popular culture, such as fictions, movies and investigative reality programs, the mass media accidentally distort parts of the true criminal profile. It is not too hard to turn the television on and come across a crime reality show that is currently introducing its unfold mysteries. Perhaps, viewers are curious enough to the broadcast for not to skim over googles with a proper idea of "criminal profile". For one thing, people believe it to be a "superior" approach to identify psychopaths, rapists, and serial killers; and for another, producers and moviemakers stretch the problem of accuracy further by embellishing the terminology of "criminal profile". Finally, as a product of "salutary entertainment", criminal profile becomes an "unbeatable" approach to arrest offenders. In fact, criminal profile depends on cases. While the method aids the FBI in making a sketch of the offender, it also brings up the biggest disadvantage. In this case police officers may identify wrong perpetrators whereas the real one still lives outside the law. Other possibilities are that criminal profilers come to a deadlock because of their inability to connect and draw a conclusion from the vast range of possible evidences. For example, the utility of criminal profile is not helpful or is irrelevant in Jeffrey Dahmer case. Due to the fact that he hoarded a huge amount bodies of victims, it's clear that little evidence and identifiable objects were presented. Hence, criminal profilers and forensic psychologists absolutely have no general ideas of how and what type of the killer was. At this point, development of a criminal profile is impossible.