Deductive Criminal Profiling: Comparing Apllied Methodologies between Inductive and Deductive Profiling Techniques
by Brent E. Turvey, MS
January, 1998
Deductive Criminal Profiling
The mental health community christened the first psychological "syndrome"
in 1980, when Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was officially recognized
by inclusion in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
(DSM-III). Since that time, the investigative term "profile" has slowly
become synonymous with the psychological term "syndrome" in the eyes of
the legal community. The process of criminal profiling in its original
form, as taught by Howard Teten and Pat Mullany at the FBI beginning in
1969, was completely different in origins and methodology from the construct
of the psychological syndrome. With time, however, the two
terms "profile" and "syndrome" have been wrongfully confederated because
of the way some profiles are constructed, and the subsequent litigation
[1], [2].
As the above infers, not all profiling methodology is the same, due
largely to the fact that not all profilers are equally trained or able.
In fact, this author will propose that there are essentially two very
different types of profiling being done by criminal investigators and criminologists
in the United States. The first profiling method will be termed
Inductive Criminal Profiling, and is related conceptually to the construction
of psychological syndromes and subsequent syndrome evidence. The second,
less common, method of profiling will be termed Deductive Criminal Profiling.
The purpose of this work is to overview the nature of Deductive Criminal
Profiling, and demonstrate how its origins, assumptions, and methodology
are fundamentally different from the origins, assumptions, and methodology
of Inductive Criminal Profiling, and by inference syndrome evidence.
Inductive Criminal Profiling & Syndromes
For legal purposes, according to Moenssens et al [3], a
syndrome or a profile is "a set of behavioral indicators forming a very
characteristic pattern of actions or emotions that tend to point to a particular
condition." (note an emphasis on pointing to a condition, lending itself
to purposes of treatment).
A more useful description comes from State of Oregon v. Lawson [4],
where the defense tried to introduce expert testimony stating that their
client, Mr. Lawson, did not match the profile of a sex offender, and by
extension of that logic could not therefore be one. The court in that case
found that "Whether it is labeled a 'syndrome' or a 'profile', the type
of evidence...involves comparing an individual's behavior with the behavior
of others in similar circumstances who have been studied in the past."
An Inductive Criminal Profile is one that is generalized to an individual
criminal from initial behavioral and demographic characteristics shared
by other criminals who have been studied in the past. It is the product
of incomplete, statistical analysis and generalization (very often without
comparison to norms), hence the descriptor Inductive. This author
takes the descriptor from the phrase Inductive Statistics, which is the
branch of statistics involving generalizations, predictions,
estimations and decisions from data initially presented [5].
The datasets currently used to compile and statistically generalize
Inductive Criminal Profiles are collected largely from three sources:
1.Formal and informal studies of known, incarcerated
criminal populations, and the inherent clinical and non-clinical interviews
upon which those studies are based;
2.Practical experience, from which isolated anecdotal
data is recalled by the profiler; and
3.Public data sources, including the popular media
(for example, the FBI readily admits that newspaper articles are collected
by its personnel and used to fill out its computerized database of violent
criminal offender activity in the United States).
| Inductive Criminal Profiling: |
The process of profiling criminal behavior, crime scenes, and victims
from the known behaviors and emotions suggested by other criminals, crime
scenes, and/or victims.&
In essence, as the term suggests, this is reasoning from initial statistical
data to specific criminal offender behavior. In any event, Inductive Criminal
Profiling is generally the result of some kind of statistical analysis,
or finds it's reasoning in cases outside of the case at hand. |
| Example of the logic: |
80% of known serial killers that attack college students in parking
lots are white males age 20-35 who live with their mothers and drive Volkswagen
Bugs-- Our offender has attacked at least three female college students
on separate occasions; our offender has attacked all three victims in parking
lots.
Therefore, our offender, who is part of this large group who fit this
"profile" called "serial killers" is a white male age 20-35, lives with
his mother, and drives a VW Bug. |
The advantages of the Inductive Criminal Profiling model are
readily apparent. Foremost is that Inductive Profiling is a very easy
tool to use, for which no specialized forensic knowledge, education,
or training in the study of criminal behavior or criminal investigation
is required. Additionally, general profiles can be assembled in a relatively
short period of time without any great effort or ability on the part of
the profiler. The result is often a one or two page list of unqualified
characteristics. These generalizations can accurately predict some of
the non-distinguishing elements of individual criminal behavior, but not
with a great deal of consistency or reliability.
There are currently a number of separate initiatives under way in both
the United States and Canada to automate part or all of this process with
databasing tools and neural computer networks.
The major disadvantages of the Inductive Criminal Profiling model
are equally apparent to the critical thinker. Firstly, the information
itself is generalized from limited population samples, and not specifically
related to any one case, therefore it is not by its nature intended for
reconstructing a "profile" of an individual person. It is a generalized
set of representations, averaged from a small group of individuals who
may or may not have been appropriately sampled, depending on the knowledge
and ability of the person collecting and assembling the data. Secondly,
and perhaps most commonly noted, is that Inductive profiles are generalized
and averaged from the limited data collected only from known, apprehended
offenders. An Inductive Criminal Profile does not fully or accurately
take into account current offenders who are at large, therefore it is by
its very nature missing datasets from the most intelligent or skillful
criminal populations; the criminals who are successful in continually avoiding
detection by law enforcement. A third major disadvantage is that, as
with any such generalization, an Inductive Criminal Profile is going to
contain specific inaccuracies that can and have been used to implicate
innocent individuals. This occurs when an Inductive Criminal Profile
is used as some sort of infallible predictive measure by an unprofessional,
trigger-happy profiler. Recent examples include the 1996 case of Richard
Jewell in the "Olympic Park Bombing" and, also in 1996, the Colin Stagg
profile debacle in Great Britain.
Assumptions of the Inductive Criminal Profiling model include:
* Small groups of known offenders, who commit
the same types of crimes as unknown offenders, have commonly shared individual characteristics that can be accurately generalized back to initially similar
individual unknown offenders.
* Offenders who have committed crimes in the past are
culturally similar to current offenders, being influenced by at least similar
environmental conditions and existing with the same general and sometimes
specific motivations.
* Individual human behavior and characteristics can be
generalized and even predicted from the initial statistical analysis of
characteristics and behavior in very small samples.
* Behavior and motivation do not change within an individual
over time, being static, predictable characteristics
Inductive Profilers include the following groups of professionals, who
have various backgrounds:
* FBI and ex-FBI profilers who have been
trained since John Douglas took over the Behavioral Sciences Unit in 1984.
Current FBI profiles are on average less than a page long and offer no
explanation for the content of the profile. Most law enforcement agencies
that this author has discussed the issue with have had little or no use
for those types of profiles. Nor do most courtrooms.
* Forensic Psychologists and Forensic Psychiatrists,
who rely solely on clinical personality measurements such as the MMPI when
formulating any kind of criminal personality profile.
* Many of the law enforcement profilers who have
received FBI training since 1984, including Georgia Bureau of Investigation,
ATF, and various state and local detectives. GBI, as has been highly publicized,
is the agency responsible for generating the Richard Jewell profile.
* Criminologists: a criminologist is defined as
someone who studies criminal behavior. It does not imply training, education,
or experience. The term criminologist generally refers to someone who does
scholarly, scientific and professional study concerning the etiology, prevention,
control, and treatment of crime and delinquency, including the measurement
and detection of crime, legislation, and the practice of criminal law,
the law enforcement, judicial, and correctional systems. It is a category
that, despite its ambitious definition, can include almost anyone in actual
application.
The professional backgrounds of those listed does not necessarily include
forensic training in criminal psychology, abnormal psychology, or psychopathology,
and certainly does not imply any kind of experience with investigating
violent serial criminals. For example, most people are not aware that FBI
agents do not have jurisdiction at any homicide unless it occurs in a federal
building or on an Indian Reservation, giving most FBI agents no applied
experience investigating this type of crime whatsoever.
Deductive Criminal Profiling
A descriptive, applied definition of the Deductive Criminal Profiling
model, according to this author, is: "The process of interpreting forensic
evidence, including such inputs as crime scene photographs, autopsy reports,
autopsy photographs, and a thorough study of individual offender victimology,
to accurately reconstruct specific offender crime scene behavior patterns,
and from those specific, individual patterns of behavior, deduce offender
characteristics, demographics, emotions, and motivations."
Note the heavy emphasis on an informed forensic reconstruction, and
the exclusion of information from other similar offenders, or other similar
offenses.
A Deductive Criminal Profile is one that is deduced from the careful
forensic examination and behavioral reconstruction of a single offender's
crime scene(s). After the offender's behaviors have been reconstructed,
the crime scene characteristics are analyzed, and the victim characteristics
are analyzed. From those combined characteristics, a profile with the
characteristics of the individual who could have committed that specific
offense(s), with that specific victim(s) under the conditions present at
that specific crime scene(s) is deductively inferred. It is a forensically
and behaviorally contained process. The process of deductive profiling
is most appropriately termed Behavior Evidence Analysis, and depends
on the analyst's abilities to recognize patterns of behavior within a single
offender to deduce meaning.
Offender emotions during the offense, individual patterns of offense
behavior, and offender personality characteristics are deduced from that
particular offender's crime scene behavior and victimology only.
| Deductive Criminal Profiling: |
The Behavioral Evidence Analysis a specific criminal, crime scene(s),
and victim(s) exclusively from forensic evidence relating to the crime
scene(s) and victim(s) of that offender alone. |
| Example of the logic: |
The body of a female victim is found nude in a remote forest location
with 4 shallow, careful incisions on the chest, cutting across the nipples.
The victim's genital areas have all been removed with a sharp instrument.
Petechiae are evident in the eyes, neck and face above pattern compression
on the neck. No blood is found at the crime scene. No clothes are found
at the crime scene. The victim bears ligature furrows around her wrists
with abraded contusions but no ligature is present. Fresh tire impressions
are found in the mud approximately 20 yards from where the body is located.
Therefore the offender in this particular offense bound the victim to
restrain her while she was still alive indicated by the abrasions around
the wrists associated with struggling. Our offender removed the ligature
before disposing of the body, indicated by the fact that we didn't find
it at the scene. The victim was likely asphyxiated with a material ligature
about the neck, indicated by the pattern compression and the petechiae.
The location where the body was found is a disposal site and not the actual
location of the offense indicated by the fact that no blood was present
at this location. The offender has a vehicle consistent with the tire impressions
and is mobile. All of these details together indicate a competent, intelligent
offender whom is likely able to sustain employment, and is very likely
a sexual sadist. This is deductively suggested by the vehicle, the use
of a secondary scene to dispose of the body to avoid transfer evidence,
the removal of the victim's genitals, and the deliberate cutting to the
victim's nipples intended to cause pain but not seriously injure. |
The data used to infer a Deductive Criminal Profile for a particular
criminal includes the following:
1.Forensic Evidence: A full equivocal
forensic analysis must be performed before profiling can begin, to insure
the integrity of the behavior and the crime scene characteristics that
are to be analyzed. Nothing can be assumed by the profiler.
2.Crime Scene Characteristics: Crime scene characteristics
are determined from all forensic reports, all forensic analysis, and all
forensic documentation which provides the nature of the interaction between
the victim(s), the offender, and the location(s) of the offense during
the occasion of a specific offense. In cases involving a related series
of offenses, such as in serial rape, or serial homicide, crime scene characteristics
are determined individually and analyzed as they evolve, or fail to evolve,
over time. An offender's crime scene characteristics, in a single offense
or over multiple offenses, can lend themselves to inferences about offender
motive, modus operandi, and the determination of crime scene signature.
3.Victimology: Victimology is the thorough study
and analysis of victim characteristics. The characteristics of an individual
offender's victim population of choice, in a single offense or over time,
can lend themselves to deductive inferences about offender motive, modus
operandi, and the determination of crime scene signature. In Deductive
Profiling, almost as much time is spent profiling each victim as the offender
responsible for the crime(s).
The advantages> of the Deductive Criminal Profiling model are very
important. This model requires specialized education and training in forensic
science, crime scene reconstruction, and wound pattern analysis. Because
of this requisite specialized knowledge, Deductive Criminal Profiles tend
to be more specific than Inductive Criminal Profiles, assisting greatly
in the major goal of the profiling process, which is to move from a universal
set of suspect characteristics to a more unique set of suspect characteristics.
Deductive Criminal Profiling is also useful for thoroughly establishing
Modus Operandi behavior, as well as offender signature behavior, which
assists in the linkage of seemingly unrelated crimes. According to
Geberth [6], the Modus Operandi, or MO behavior, or method of operation,
is a dynamic, learned behavior, changing over time, as the offender becomes
more experienced. It involves only those actions that are necessary to
commit the offense.
Signature behavior, or the signature aspect of criminal behavior, as Geberth [7] defines it, is comprised of those behaviors not required
to commit the offense. Signature is comprised of significant personality
identifiers that distinguish the nature of the offender's crime scene methodology.
These significant and highly individualized personality identifiers are
evident in such things as:
* When an offender repeatedly engages in a specific order of sexual activity;
* When an offender repeatedly uses a specific type of
binding;
* When an offender inflicts similar types of injuries
to different victims;
* When an offender displays the body in a certain manner
for shock value;
* When an offender tortures and/or mutilates his victims,
and/or engages in some other form of specific ritualistic behavior.
Another very tangible advantage of the Deductive Criminal Profiling method
is that, because it so thoroughly explores victimology, and the nature
of the interaction between the victim(s), the crime scene(s), and the offender,
it
can very pointedly demonstrate an individual offender's motivations in
even the most bizarre or seemingly senseless offenses. As Geberth insightfully
reminds us in his foundational work Practical Homicide Investigation,
3rd. Ed., "No one acts without motivation." Deductive Criminal Profiling
techniques explore offender actions through the physical evidence, through
the victimology, and through the crime scene as the primary behavioral
and motivational documentation, and illuminate that particular offender's
motivation. The whole profile is logic statement, based solidly on the
arguements made through an analysis of behavior patterns.
Also, due to this same thoroughness, learned or experiential generalizations
can be kept from obscuring or misleading investigations. Investigators
with a lot of years on the job, or a lot of experience investigating a
particular type of crime, tend to formulate theories about a case early
on. Instead of investigating the case, they may instead spend their efforts
attempting to prove a theory. Deductive Criminal Profiling precludes
theory generation, and subsequent bruised egos, until a full investigative
analysis has been done.
The final major advantage of the Deductive Criminal Profiling method
is that it examines behaviors of individual offenders as they occur
over time. Change and growth are allowed for, analyzed, and recompiled
back into the criminal profile. As something like offender MO behavior
or motivations change or evolve over the course of multiple offenses in
an offender's career, it is noticed and it used to better understand the
offender.
The disadvantages of Deductive Criminal Profiling are somewhat
few, but well worth noting. First is that it is not a quick fix or a cure
all; it requires a great deal of effort and multi-disciplinary skill
on the part of each member of the investigative team. Second, because
it is such an intensive process, it can be extremely emotionally exhausting.
Investigators
that learn to use these techniques should take care to be emotionally grounded
individuals and not be afraid to discuss any emotional difficulties with
those close to them. And third, a Deductive Criminal Profile cannot
not point out a specific known individual and say with confidence that
they are likely responsible for a certain crime or series of crimes unless
that offender's unique signature is known and established.
Assumptions of the Deductive Criminal Profiling method include:
* No offender acts without motivation.
* Every single offense should be investigated as its
own unique behavioral and motivational existent. Given the nature of human
behavior, no two cases are really ever alike.
* Some offenders have unique motivations and/or behaviors
that should be individuated from other similar offenders.
* All human behavior develops uniquely, over time, in
response to environmental and biological factors.
* Criminal MO behavior can evolve over time and over
the commission of multiple offenses.
* A single offender is capable of multiple motives over
the commission of multiple offenses, or even during the commission of a
single offense.
* Statistical generalizations and experiential theorizing,
while sometimes helpful, are incomplete and can ultimately mislead an investigation,
and encourage investigative laziness. When we think that we have all of
the answers in a case, not only might we only collect evidence that fits
those answers, we might think that a thorough investigation is no longer
requisite at all.
Conclusions
The Inductive Profiling model, due largely to the lack of uniform
training and education on the part of those who use it, has proven time
and time again to be an unreliable source of investigative guidance. No
standard terminology exists to describe offender behavior, and no classifications
that have been developed have ever been validated, such as the crime scene
classification efforts in the Crime Classification Manual [8]. Furthermore,
those classifications have been developed using the same structure as the
DSM, despite the intention that the DSM be used for the purposes of treatment,
and not being designed for the purposes of criminal investigation. The
adoption of this clinical model, then, serves no other real purpose than
to lend pseudo-clinical credibility to the classification. The model does
not serve the purpose that it was designed for.
Furthermore, initial statistical analysis based on unproven classifications
and non-uniform terminology are no replacement for a thorough forensic
reconstruction, crime scene analysis, and victimological assessment in
either a criminal investigation or in a court of law. Given this fact,
and given the extensive liability of police departments in high profile
cases involving overzealous investigators armed with Inductive Profile
evidence, and the general inadmissibility of Inductive "Profile" evidence in a court of law, the practice of teaching investigators
purely Inductive Profiling methods should end.
The multi-disciplinary Deductive Profiling method, though more time
consuming in the investigative end, will prove to be more effective because
of its usefulness as an investigative guide, its competency at linking
crimes, and because of its very high probative value in terms of thoroughly
establishing signature and motivation. In short, the Deductive Profiling
method encourages deliberation, competency, thoroughness, and requires
a high degree of intra- and extra-departmental cohesiveness and communication.
The Inductive Profiling method encourages egocentricity, investigative
short-cuts, and has been used in the past to replace a competent forensic
investigation into fact.
In the past, when this author has attempted to explain the Deductive
Profiling process to individuals involved in criminal investigations, those
investigators have said, "It sounds like you're trying to trick us into
doing more work." To which this author has always responded, "You're right."
ENDNOTES
1.United States v. Banks, 1988
2.United States v. Sokolow, 1989
3.Moenssens, A., Starrs, J., Henderson, C., & Inbau, F., Scientific
Evidence in Civil and Criminal Cases, 4th Ed., (New York: Foundation Press,
1995), pp. 1146-1147
4.State of Oregon v. Lawson, 1994
5.The American Heritage Dictionary, 2nd Ed., (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1982)
6.Geberth, Vernon "The Signature Aspect in Criminal Investigation,"
Law and Order, November, 1995, pp.45-49
7.Ibid.
8.Burgess, A. G., Burgess, A. W., Douglas, J., Ressler, R. Crime Classification
Manual, Reprint Ed., (New York: Lexington Books, 1992) pp. 21-22.
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