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Offender Profiling: The Top-Down Approach - Coggle Diagram
Offender Profiling: The Top-Down Approach
Offender Profiling
Behavioural and analytic tool that is intended to help investigations accurately and profile characteristics of unknown offenders
The American Approach
Also known as the typology approach
Originated in US as result of work carried out by FBI
FBI's behavioral science unit drew upon data from 36 in depth interviews of sexually motivated murders including ted bundy and charles manson
Concluded that data can be categorised into organised or disorganised crime which meant in future crime scenes if data from the crime scene matched characteristics of one category , we could then predict either characteristics that would be likely. can then be used to find the offender
offender profilers who use top down approach will start with a pre established typology and work down in order to assign the murder to one of the two categories using eye witnesses and evidence
7 descision making tools
from the seven decision making tool you emerge the profile while helps classify the criminal into 'organised' or 'disorganised'
location factors
time factors
escalation
offender risk
victim risk
primary intent-deliberate, premeditated
murder type- could be p-art of several
The Typology
Organised
Characteristics
Evidence of planning
victim is a stranger
controlled conversation
use of restrainrs
removes body from scene
body hidden
Personality
average to high intelligent
socially competent
skilled employment
living with partner
sexually competent
Disorganised
Characteristics
little evidence of planning
victim is known
little conversation
leaves evidence
little use of restraint
body in open view
Personality
below average iq
socially inadequate
unskilled employment
body in open view
Constructing on FBI profile
Four main stages in the construction of an FBI profile
data assimilation - the profiler reviews the evidence (crime scene photograph, pathology, reports ect.)
crime scene classification - as either disorganised or organised
crime reconstruction - hypothesis in terms of sequence of event, behaviour of the victim
profile generation - hypothesis related to the likely offender e.g of demographic background, physical characteristics
Evaluation
Only applies to particular crimes
only suited to crime scenes that reveal important details about the suspect e.g rape, arson and cult killings. More common offences such as burglary and destruction of property do not work with profiling because the resulting crime scene reveals very little about the offender
is limited approach to identifying a criminal
Based on outdated models of personality
typology assumes that offender have patterns of behaviour and motivations that remain consistent
critics have suggested that this approach is naive and is informed by old fashioned models of personality that see behaviour as being driven by stable dispositional traits rather than external factors that may be constantly changing
top down approach is based on static models of personality likely to have poor va.idty when identify next movements
flawed evidence
fbi profiling was developed using interviews of 36 murders- 25 serial killers, 11 were double or single murders. at end of process 24 were organised and 12 were disorganised
canter argued that smaple was poor as fbi did not slecet at random or large sample, or different types of ofenders
open interview as no set questions so not comparable. suggesting that top down profiling does not have scientific basis