FBI Profiling System

Serial Killers
 Criminal Profiling
Criminal profiler—a person who infers the
personality and characteristics of a suspect
based on information gathered from a crime
scene
Criminal profilers study evidence collected
and analyzed by crime-scene investigators to
formulate a hypothesis about a perpetrator’s
Age
Personality
Lifestyle
Social environment
 Serial Killers
 Hillside Stranglers  BTK
 Son of Sam  Jerry Brudos
 Jeff Dahmer  Andrei Chikatilo
 John Wayne Gacy  Peter Sutcliffe
 Nightstalker  Joel Rifkin
 Ed Kemper  Jack the Ripper
 Ted Bundy  Henry Lee Lucas
 Trailside Killer  Wayne Williams
 Zodiac  Green River Killer
 Ed Gein  Ivan Milat
 Peter Kurten
Definitions of a Serial
Killer
 Someone who murders at least 3
people in more than a 30 day
period
Someone who murders 2 or more
victims with an emotional cooling
off period between the homicides
Someone who over time commits
at least 10 homicides which are
violent and brutal and ritualistic
 Profiling Beginnings
 UNSUB-unknown subject
 “If you want to understand the
artist you have to look at the
painting”
 What took place?
 Why did it happen the way it did?
 Who could have committed this
crime for these reasons?
 Inside the Mind of a Killer
 They sense weakness and vulnerability
 Thrill of the hunt gets them going
 Behavior reflects personality
 “Homicidal triad”-cruelty to small
animals, fire-setting and bedwetting
beyond an appropriate age
 Three most common motives of serial
killers and rapists are DOMINATION,
MANIPULATION and CONTROL
 Serial killers are sexual predators
 Inside the Mind…
 One of their main fantasy jobs is police
officer
 Many are “police buffs”-they hang out
at police bars and talk shop. They also
like to find out about the investigation
 Triggering event-”stressor”-most
common are losing job and losing
wife/girlfriend
 Inside the Mind…
 Most single important factor in the
development of a serial killer is the role
of fantasy
 Many fantasize about a relationship
between sex and death (Ed Kemper,
Jeff Dahmer)
 Behavior escalates from fantasy to
reality, helped along by pornography
and cruelty to animals and peers.
Fantasy is in place long before murders
start
 The Role of Fantasy
 82% of serial killers report daydreaming
in their childhood accompanied by
compulsive masturbation.
 Unhealthy sexual fantasies
 If fantasies are violent, violence and sex
become associated with one another
 71% report feeling isolated as children.
Isolation encourages substitution of
fantasy for human contact
 Sadistic fantasies
 Sadism- psychological disorder in which a
person derive pleasure from inflicting pain
 The Role of Fantasy:
Test Runs
 Serial killers start out by giving the
fantasy a test run
 This involves cruelty to animals
and small children
 Stealing women’s underwear,
exhibitionism, voyeurism, burglary
and other minor offenses
 A Theory…
 66% of sexual and serial killers
report their mother as the
dominant parent
 S.K. rooted in gender identification
 If mother is too dominant, boys
cannot achieve masculinity which
creates rage
 Rage is focused on females
 Organized or
Disorganized?
Organized Disorganized
 Continual refinement  Bodily mutilation
of fantasy  Socially awkward
 Improvement of  Lack of preparation
details from one crime  Body left in view
to the next
 Violence is sudden
 Obsession with detail and possible blitz
 Planning of crime and attack
disposal of body  Often they are
 Socially competent severely disturbed
 Follows crime in the  Some UNSUBS are
news mixed
 intelligent
 M.O. vs Signature
Modus Operandi Signature
 Learned behavior  What the UNSUB
 What the UNSUB does does to fulfill
himself
to commit the crime
(shooting, stabbing)  Does not change
 He NEEDS to do it
 Type of weapon
 Expresses the
 Preference of victims UNSUB’s
 Could include posing personality
body or what UNSUB  Example placing a
does to victim bow under
 It can change victim’s chin
 History of Serial Killing

 Serial killing may be a much older

phenomenon than we realize
 Stories about witches, werewolves,
vampires may have been created
to explain atrocities committed by
humans (Chikatilo)
 Beowulf-Grendel
 Stages of Profiling
Input
Photographing crime scene and
gathering and documenting evidence
 Stages of Profiling
Decision Process Models
Classify crime scene
Single, double, or triple homicide, Mass
murder,Killing spree, Serial murder
Determining Motive
Victomology and Risk Level
Study of victim
Helps determine suspects
Risky vs nonrisky lifestye
Nonrisky then more common victim knows
perpetrator
 Stages of Profiling
Crime Assessment
Reconstructing the crime
MO and Signature
Criminal Profile
Determining characteristics of UNSUB
base on evidence and clues
Some crimes fit patterns
Serial arsonist typically white males 18-
27, loners with history of drug or alcohol
abuse
Most serial killers white males 25-34
 Stages of Profiling
Investigation
Identifying and monitoring potential
suspects that fit profile
Apprehension
 History of Serial Killing
Gilles de Rais
 Lived during the 1400’s
 Bodyguard of Joan of Arc
 One of the wealthiest people in Europe
 Sexually molested and killed at least
140 and no more than 800 peasant
boys
 Practiced necrophilia with dead boys
 Hanged and burned
 History…
Countess Elizabeth Bathory
 Born in Transylvania in the 1500’s
 Belonged to noble family
 Sadist, liked to torture servants
 Drained victims’ blood and bathed in it
 Murdered 650 women in 10 years
 Bricked up her bedroom and could not
leave
 Jack the Ripper

First modern day serial killer

1888 Whitechapel, London
 5 victims in 3 months
Killings stopped suddenly
Identity unknown
 Jack the Ripper Victims

Polly Nichols Annie Chapman

Elizabeth Stride
Victims (continued)
Catherine Eddowes
Mary Kelly
Ripper Letters
Profiling Jack the Ripper
 Mutilation of bodies suggests sexually
inadequate person with rage against
women
 Blitz style attack suggests someone
socially inadequate
 Someone who could blend into
surroundings
 Loner
 Disorganized offender
 Ed Kemper
Q: “What do you
think when you
see a pretty girl
walking down the
street?”
A: “One side of
me says I’d like to
talk to her, date
her. The other
side of me says I
wonder how her
head would look
on a stick?”
 Kemper, con’t
 Born 1948
 IQ 145
 6’9” 280 lbs
 Extremely domineering mother
 Forced to sleep on basement, killed
family cat and mounted head on a stick.
Did same thing to sister’s doll.
 As a child, he would watch his second
grade teacher through her window
while holding a bayonet. Fantasized
about killing her and having sex with
 Kemper, con’t
 At age 13 killed another cat and kept
pieces in his closet
 Sent to live with grandparents at age
15
 Shot grandmother in head with .22 rifle
and stabbed her repeatedly
 When grandfather came home he shot
him, too
 Sent to psychiatric hospital for 5 years
 Kemper, con’t
 Tried to join police force but deemed
“too big”
 Frequented police bars and after he
started killing, got inside info on
investigation
 Started picking up female hitchhikers
and dropping them off safely to
establish a reputation
 Would look at his watch when picking
them up so they would think he was
busy (manipulation)
 Kemper, con’t
 First kill 1972
 Picked up two hitchhikers, put one in
the trunk, stabbed the other and slit her
throat
 Grabbed the girl from the trunk and
stabbed her, too
 Took them back to his apt, dissected
them, played with the internal organs,
took pics and cut their heads off
 Holding their heads by the hair would
sexually excite him
 Kemper, con’t
 Killed 6 other girls by 1973, shooting,
stabbing, strangulation
 Practiced necrophilia, dismembered
bodies
 Never touched “improper areas” (quote)
 1973 he killed his mother and raped her
corpse, then killed mother’s friend
 Called police and turned himself in
 Profiling Kemper
 Dismemberment of corpses was
part of the possession fantasy-
alive he could not get near them,
but dead, he could touch their
insides and feel as if he owned
them (domination, control)
 Organized offender
 David Berkowitz

“I didn’t want to hurt them. I only wanted to kill them.”

David Berkowitz: The .44
Caliber Killer, Son of Sam
 Very upset over being adopted
 Practiced Satanism and worship
 Admits to setting more than 2,000 fires,
would masturbate while watching the
flames (part of the triad)
 Started killing in 1976
 Killed 6, wounded others, shot into
parked cars
 Would return to the scene of the crime
to relive the killings, go home and
masturbate
 Profiling Son of Sam
 Always shot at passenger side of
car-shows hatred toward women
 Shooting multiple shots indicates
degree of rage
 Shooting from a distance suggests
that the killer lacks social skills
John Wayne Gacy
 John Wayne Gacy
“The Killer Clown”
 Born 1942
 Homosexual
 Killed 33 men and young boys
 Beaten by father and claims he was
molested by a teenaged girl and a male
construction worker when he was 8
 Married in 1964 but divorced 4 years
later after sodomizing a young boy
 After being released from prison, he
brought a man home for sex, killed him
and buried him in the crawl space
 Gacy, con’t
 Married again in 1972.
 Lured young boys to his house, raped
and murdered them and buried their
bodies under the house
 Blamed smell on dead rats
 Placed plastic bag over heads and
submerged them in water, reviving
them before they died then strangled
them (domination and control)
 Executed 1994
 Profiling Gacy
 Organized killer-continual
refinement of crimes, hiding the
bodies
 Socially competent-lured his
victims to his house
Richard Ramirez
 Richard Ramirez
“The Nightstalker”
 Mixed category serial killer
 LA 1984-1985, 19 people killed
 Men were shot or strangled,
women shot, stabbed, raped and
mutilated
 One victim’s eyes were gouged out
with a spoon
 Nightstalker, con’t
 At age 12, cousin showed him pics of
Vietnamese women performing sex acts
on soldiers and then later, their severed
heads-this excited him
 Later, Richard saw this cousin kill his
wife; behavior went downhill after this
 Used pot, LSD, PCP, got interested in
Satan and attended Satanic rituals
 Nightstalker, con’t
 Snuck into people’s homes at night
 Stabbed 79 year old and had sex with
the corpse
 Killed women of all ages, age 6-83.
 Mutilated corpses, violently raped
women and children
 All attacks were blitz attacks
 Picture was broadcast in paper and in
the news
 Mobbed and beaten in east LA while
trying to steal a car
 Profiling the Nightstalker
 Mixed category killer-killed at random,
but brought his own weapons and
carried a police scanner
 Socially incompetent-snuck into
people’s homes
 Sexually inexperienced, attacks on very
old and very young
 Blitz style attack-little confidence and
low self-esteem
 Men shot but women raped and
mutilated. Shows hatred toward
Kenneth Bianchi and
Angelo Buono
 The Hillside Stranglers
Kenneth Bianchi Angelo Buono
 Adopted  Parents were divorced,
referred to her as a
 Very overprotective, whore and a slut
domineering mother  Juvenile delinquent with
 Wet his pants at a no respect for women
late age  Raped his wives and
girlfriends, beating them
 Very charming, con on several occasions
man  Had many teenaged girls
 Unmotivated drifter, as girlfriends and
finally moved to CA “shared” them with his
to live with his sons
cousin
 The Hillside Stranglers
 Cousins who acted as a team
 1977-1978 raped and murdered 12
women, girls and prostitutes
 They would pick up prostitutes or show
women a fake badge and put them in
their car, rape and kill them
 After awhile, they started bringing them
home and killing them there
 The Hillside Stranglers
 They started killing them slowly
 They would tighten a cord around their
throats and bring them to the point of
death and then release it-they would do
this over and over, sometimes raping
them at the same time
 They started injecting them with
Windex and electrocuting them to see
what would happen
 Profiling The Hillside
Stranglers
 They raped them and killed them
slowly-shows the need for domination,
manipulation and control
 Organized killers-they disposed of/hid
bodies and were “improving” on their
methods each time
 They were able to get the girls into their
car because Bianchi was socially
competent
 The use of the badge also depicts the
desire for power
 Female Killers
 One out of every 5 serial murderers are
women
 Often more deadly and prolific than
men
 “quiet killers”
 Killing career is longer
 Killings usually committed in
homes/hospitals, somewhere not that
noticeable
 Motives are often personal financial
gain
 Types of Female Killers
Black Widows
 Most common type of female killer
 Focus on husbands, children, lovers
 85% use poison
 Motive is material gain
Marie Hilley
Blanche Taylor Moore
 Angels of Death
 Kill victims in their care
 Nurses kill babies, old people
 Childcare workers who kill children
 Motives are attention and praise,
sense of power, misguided sense
of mercy
Munchausen Syndrome by
Proxy
 Usually mothers, make children
hurt or sick to gain medical
attention. Illnesses can be real or
fabricated.
 Welcome painful medical tests
 Very involved in medical care
 Praise the medical staff
 SIDS