Lloyd 1

Matthew Vaughn Lloyd

Mr. Gunther
English 1010 Period 2
10 December 2016
Investigative Psychology and Offender Profiling
Investigative psychology is a framework for the integration of a diverse range of aspects
of psychology into all areas of criminal and civil investigation. It is concerned with all forms of
criminality that may be examined by the police, from arson and burglary to murder, rape or even
terrorism (Youngs 322). These crimes are committed by individuals who have different
mindsets and views on life than that of the general population. These suspects may have
sociopathic tendencies, or psychotic behaviors that make them dangerous to the public. Often
these people may attack others because of their skewed views on humanity, because of the
danger that they possess investigative psychology has groups like the behavior analysis unit who
specialize in the capture of these people. One such way this is achieved is through profiling.
Offender profiling is the process of linking offenders actions at a crime scene to their most
likely characteristics to help police investigators narrow down and prioritize a pool of most likely

suspects(Canter 2000). The media has greatly distorted the view of this practice in shows like
Criminal Minds. In the T.V. show the B.A.U. team flies all around the country to assist various
police departments

in catching criminals. In reality, the investigators are not running around

physically catching the criminals; profilers at the B.A.U. mainly look at data on spreadsheets
and pictures of the evidence to create a profile of the offender.

Lloyd 2

The origins of profiling are arguably one of the most interesting aspects of the practice.
It all started with one of the most famous serial killers of all time, Jack the Ripper. In 1888,
London was being terrorized by a serial killer that became known as Jack the Ripper, due to his
extremely brutal methods of murder. The people of London were terrified at the thought of
being attacked by this menace, and the police were at a loss for who they were looking for. In a
desperate attempt to gain any leads the police consulted Dr. Thomas Bond, a local doctor and
arguably the closest thing to a psychologist at the time, offered this, the first profile.
The murder must have been a man of physical strength and great coolness and
daring. There is no evidence he had an accomplice. He must in my opinion be a
man subject to periodic attacks of homicidal and erotic mania. THe character of
the mutilations indicate that the man may be a condition sexually, that may be
called Satyriasis. It is of course possible that the homicidal impulse may have
developed from a revengeful or brooding condition of the mind, or that religious
mania may have been the original disease but I do not think either hypothesis is
likely. The murderer in external appearance is quite likely to be a quite
inoffensive looking man probably middle-aged and neatly and respectably
dressed. I think he might be in the habit of wearing a cloak or an overcoat or he
could hardly have escaped notice in the streets if the blood on his clothes and
hands were visible. (Rumbelow 140-141).
In the media the action of creating a profile is made to look like it is an easy task, but in reality it
is very time consuming and includes long hours of research. In Criminal Minds the B.A.U.
profilers take one look at the scene and suspect pool and they have a profile. In reality it takes

Lloyd 3

much longer for a profile to be created, the profilers have to look at multiple crime scenes and
look for similarities and try to decide why the offender is targeting these victims and why he
does what he does to them. The Jack profile is extremely advanced considering the research and
technology of the the time that it was released. Unfortunately since Jack was never caught, even
with this very descriptive profile he still managed to evade the authorities. One cause for the
failure of his capture is that the police were unprepared for a criminal of such intelligence and
skill. My own personal theory is that the profile may be incorrect. I think that there is a large
flaw in the profile that made the authorities look for someone who did not match what Jack was
really about. With such advanced profile I find it hard for the authorities miss someone who
acted as frequently as Jack did. I believe that the profile narrowed the vision of the investigators
enough for Jack to slip under the radar and continue his work. Again this is my own personal
theory that I have developed in my research as a potential way to explain why Jack was never
caught. Correct or not the profile still paved the way for many more profiles that helped catch
some of the most dangerous criminals that the world has ever seen.
Today modern profilers will have the same accuracy and language that was seen in the
first profile. Modern profiles still include race, approximate age, and social behaviors. One great
difference today, however, is that there are a plethora of new techniques used to further the depth
of the profile; one such technique is the A to C equation, or the AC equation. In the definition I
used to describe offender profiling is where the AC equation can be explained. Offender
profiling is the process of linking offenders actions (A) at the crime scene to their most likely
characteristics (C) (Canter 2000). The AC equation works like most equations where you plug
something into the equation and you get something out of it. The A in this equation is the

Lloyd 4

specific actions that occurred in the crime such as signatures or other markings or actions that
will stand out to an investigator. A signature is a thing that a psychotic serial killer will do to the
body or the crime scene to mark it as his or her own work. Jack the Ripper would use many
signatures such as overkill and organ harvesting, because of Jacks signature he was feared even
more than an average killer because of the sheer brutality of his kills. A signature can be
something that the criminal is emotionally compelled to do or it can be something the offender
does to prove a point or send a message. Another thing that can be recognized in the A
category of the scene is the Modus Operandi (Mode of Operation) or MO. The MO is what the
offender must do in order to commit the crime. For example, the killer must have a means to
control his victims at the crime scene such as tying them up. Significantly, the MO is a learned
behavior that is subject to change(Bonn 2). Often the offender will hone and change his MO to
make the crimes easier to commit, for example if the offender would use rope in his earlier
crimes he may find that handcuffs are more effective and he will begin using them instead. Once
the signature and MO are recognized it becomes easy to link crimes together and compare
evidence to further the investigation. The C in the equation is the characteristics of the
offenders, such as obsession and agitation, these behaviors would make offenders stand out to
the general public making it easy to point them out to authorities. Once the equation has been
processed it becomes easy to use the information to make predictions based on the killers habits
and signatures. Once a prediction is made the process of catching the offender is simplified
because the authorities know the behaviors of the offender and can use his habits to make
predictions on his or her next moves. The AC equation is arguably the most used tool that

Lloyd 5

profilers will employ when creating a profile because the equation shows what the offender will
do and help point to why the offender does what he does.
By this point we have discussed the what happened and how they did it in a crime with
the AC equation and MO. Another massive clue in investigating murders is the victimology, or
the who. Victimology refers to the reason that the offender is targeting the specific group of
people, at first glance many murders may seem random but with serial crimes there is often a
specific target group. Examples include famous killer John Wayne Gacy who would only target
young and adolescent boys for his crimes because of his sexuality, the boys were easy targets
that would satisfy his needs. In the early stages of the investigation it is largely unknown why
the offender targets the group that he has chosen until there has been several victims, once the
victims are compared a pattern will usually emerge and the authorities will begin to understand
why the offender is targeting these people. Often the offender will begin targeting people that
remind him of people that he feels have wronged him. It is common for the offender to not have
the opprotunity to physically harm the real person who wronged him so he will target people
who look like or remind him of the person who wronged him. A less common reason for
targeting a group of people is because the offender sees himself as a vigilante who needs to clean
up the streets by attacking prostitutes, the homeless, and drug addicts. Almost no killers are
categorized as vigilante killers because many of the offender's care little about the public
eliminating the need to help them by cleaning the streets.
In an investigation the offenders that need to be profiled are much different than the
average person in many ways. Because of their differences the offenders have different ways of
feeling and expressing thoughts and emotions. This is something because of the locus of desired

Lloyd 6

effects (Canter 1995). The offender will look at the victim in three possible ways. the first is as
an object, the second is as a vehicle, and the third is as a person. If the offender sees the victim
as an the offender will likely use the person to get what the he or she wants, whether it be theft,
gratification, or something else entirely. The offender will gain power over the victim by
coercion, threats, or even torture. Because the offender sees the victim as nothing more than an
object to be used, the offender will feel little or no remorse for what he or she does to the victim.
When a victim is used as a vehicle the offender sees the victim as a representation of his or her
own emotional state such as anger, sadness, etc. Unfortunately for the victim many because they
are seen as a way for the offenders to rid themselves of negative emotions the victim will suffer
extreme amounts of abuse and violence. Often the offender may not realize what he or she is
doing because they are so caught up in emotions that their judgement is clouded. When the
victim is seen as a person it generally means that the offender wants a relationship with the
victim. The offender may see the victim as a friend or lover, in some cases the offender may
even see the victim as a representation of a person that the offender has lost. The danger of this
view is if the victim does not perform in the way the offender wants the victim may be abused or
even killed. When trying to understand an offender it is important to see how he sees his
victims, if that is understood it will reveal clues about what he is doing and why he is doing it.
A very important part to any crime scene, unique or not, is finding the motive. When
dealing with psychotic criminals the motive is either easy to see or hard to see, no real grey area.
Many motives can be influenced by fantasies of the offender. The offender may see everyone
around him as a threat or as inferior to him; either way to him they will need to die. If the

Lloyd 7

motive is found and it is paired with victimology it narrows down possible targets allowing
investigators to quickly stop the offender before he commits more crimes.
Another common motive is revenge, if someone has wronged the offender recently or
not, the offender has a need for revenge that will compel him to target the one who has wronged
him and those close to that person or even people that remind himself of the person who
wronged him.
The art of investigative psychology is subtle and hard to master, one must be able to see
small details that others may not catch. While there are tools that can be used to assist in
catching the criminals the investigator must often rely on his gut and experience to fill in the
missing gaps that the AC equation, victimology, viewpoints, and motive leave out. Without
investigators like these people, serial and unique crimes would be very hard to solve because of
the unique reasoning for the offense. Without profilers the police would not know who they
would be looking for, the profile narrows down the suspect list drastically allowing the police to
know who they are going after instead of going in blind. The reason many profilers are so good
at what they do is often because they too have a different mindsets. some may be borderline
sociopathic others may have different psychological issues, the fact of the matter is that it truly
does take one to know one. Profilers make catching the really bad criminals easy, they make the
threat end faster, they are heroes.

Lloyd 8

Works Cited
Canter, David. "Offender Profiling and Investigative Psychology." Journal of Investigative
Psychology
Canter, David V., and Donna Youngs. Investigative psychology: offender profiling and the
analysis of criminal action. Chichester: Wiley, a John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., Publication,
2009. Print.
"Serial Killers: Modus Operandi, Signature, Staging & Posing." Psychology Today. N.p., n.d.
Web. 06
Jan. 2017.