is a field of psychology that applies psychological principles to all aspects of police investigations and legal proceedings.

David Canter developed it and coined the term.

IP proposes that police investigations can be made more effective by drawing on knowledge from the behavioral sciences

Focus of IP

(theoretical (2), and practical)

-development of decision support systems for law enforcement

-inform investigative procedures and police training

Classification Development

Offender Profiling

Time Interval v Cooling off Period

(Definition and comparison)

“Cooling-off period”: state of returning to the offender’s usual way of life between homicides

Clinical construct with psychological meaning.

“Time Interval” the interval of time between offenses in a series

 removes the clinical aspect from cooling off period 

Focus:

Development of decision support system for law enforcement

 Inform investigative procedures and police training

Research Questions:

Salience

Consistency

Development/change

Differentiating offenders

Crime scene behaviors

Expressive: victim is important, very violent

Instrumental: victim is the vehicle to ulterior motive, homicide may be unplanned

Offenders:

Expressive: relationships of victim to offender is very important, interpersonal problems

Instrumental: impulse control, criminal history

It wasn't even remotely supported. Using SSA, all the behaviors were all over the place. They also included very high frequency behaviors, there were way more disorganized behaviors, and they broke down categories in an unnecessary way. 

They did the study to evaluate a commonly accepted theory

Schlesigner and Revit Motivational homicide spectrum 

(categories, definitions, subcategories)

Environmental - motivated by social factors, crime of obedience 

Situational - motivated by powerful feelings of stress, specific circumstances

Impulsive - chronic offenders*** spur of the moment, impulsive

Catathymic - motivated by internal conflicts, feelings of inadequacy 

Acute Catathymic - sudden, violent, unplanned. normally a regular person, murder was unplanned, just snapped. Often triggered by insult or perceived insult, victim is stranger

Chronic Catathymic - planned, rumination, violent. Victim is known to offender, some sort of relationship, planning, stalking, obsession

Compulsive - serial homicide

Profilers are better than non-profilers. Psychologists and profilers share certain skills, and psychologists did better than most of the other groups besides profilers

Kcosis 2000 evaluated FBI assumptions of what makes a good profiler, 2003 identify how profilers differed from other groups

Holmes and Holmes typology of serial homicide

types, definitions, subtypes, evaluation

Visionary - break with reality-hallucinations telling them to kill. Quick, focused method of killing. No staging

Mission - not psychotic. Target group of people determined not worthy of life (ie prostitutes). disorganized/asocial murderer, but can be organized crime scene

Hedonistic type:

Lust - sexual gratification from killing victims and  postmortem acts

Thrill - Excited by murder itself, after dead no longer interested, no postmortem acts

Comfort-oriented - personal/monetary gain, like contract killers

Power/Control: Exert power/dominance over victim. Gets off on belief that can completely control another person. Draws out murder to prolong the control

Not well supported. Subtypes of hedonistic partly supported. Others not so much

MO: Actions taken during the perpetration of a crime. Steps to carry out the crime, evade detection, etc. Develop over time, but can remain consistent (as people learn). 

Personation: Unusual behavior going beyond what is necessary to commit a crime, personal meaning, playing out a fantasy possibly. When repetitive, it becomes a signature

Staging: Intentionally changing the crime scene in a particular way before the police get there, either to protect the offender or the victim/victim's family

FBI Crime Classification Homicides

Types, subtypes, definitions of some

(4 types, 14 total subtypes)

1. Criminal Enterprise

Kidnap murder

Contract murder

Gang related murder

Criminal Competition

2. Personal Cause - caused by emotional conflict/passion, precipitated by argument/altercation

-Eroto-mania motivated murder: motivated by fantasy/preoccupation, stalking. Victim may be higher status, becomes imagined lover, develop obsessive rumination. Similar to chronic catathymic

-Domestic homicide

-Argument/Conflict homicide - excludes family/household members

-Authority murder - kills person who has authority over them

-Revenge murder

3. Sexual Homicide

-Organized/Disorganized/Mixed: Mixed - has features of both, doesn't fall under either, thought to be because of experimenting, juvenile, or situational factors

-Sadistic: Sexual gratification from torture, victim usually white female, possibly multiple crime scenes and preparations, serial killer possibly

4. Group murder

Cult murder

Extremist murder

Group excitement

single homicide crime scenes are mostly: Expressive

single homicide background characteristics are mostly: Instrumental

 serial homicide crime scenes are classified as: Expressive

serial homicide background characteristics are classified as: Instrumental

Keppel and Walter Sexual Homicide Classifications 

(4 types, definitions, weaknesses)

Power-assertive: Planned rape, unplanned murder. Stranger. Lots of violence, no mutilation

Power-reassurance: Planned rape, unplanned murder. Driven by fantasy. Deep seated feelings of sexual inadequacy, victim is stranger or acquaintance, polite and asking questions during rape to get reassurance. Possible postmortem behaviors

Anger-retaliatory: Revenge on symbolic person (Private Practice). Planned rape and murder, but could also be crime of opportunity. Violent sexual assault and overkill

Anger excitation: Planned rape and murder. Gratification from inflicting pain, sadistic. Pleasure from process, not actual murder. Postmortem sexual assault and experimentation. Fantasy driven

Weaknesses: Based on rape classification. No empirical evidence or testing of models. Lots of potential overlap. Uses lots of "may" and "possibly." Offender types are extremely specific and could apply to many, many people. No talk about situation or victim. Links behaviors to personality, motivation and background characteristics 

Single and Serial Homicide Freq. of behaviors

the continuum (30-50, 10-30 etc.)

 Types of behaviors in each bracket

Planning, evading detection// Weapon/Wounding/killing// Offender specific agenda, depersonalization

 Differences between single and serial within those frequency distributions

DIFFERENCE: 

Serial homicide had top 2 categories switched from single. Evading detection, planning, control theft and sexual was higher in serial (related to cognitive/controlled behaviors), and weapons/wounding (relating to emotionality) was lower in serial. In serial, cognitive behaviors were higher, emotionality was lower

More impulsive behaviors occur in 30-50% frequency band for single, in serial, occur in 10-30% band. Sexual/theft were higher in serial homicide. 

Serial Homicide:

30-50 - planning, evading detection, controlling victim, stealing, sexual assault

10-30 - weapon/wounding, body disposal, torture

<10 - ritual, mutilation, depersonalization, specific sexual

Single Homicide 

30-50 - weapon/wounding, killing

10-30 - planning, evade detection, 

<10 - offender specific agenda, evade detection, depersonalization,

Salfati Bateman I/E 2005

Criteria were used?

More or less valid for serial homicide?

Consistency of serial offenders across a series?

Relationship of stringency of classification to % of cases consistent

Reasons offenders may be inconsistent

Higher, 1.5x, 2x

Less valid. ~60% of single homicide could be classified, only 40% of serial.

Consistency depended on stringency used. Higher stringency was much more consistent. Using 2x criteria, they were 100% consistent. So, in general, not that consistent. Behavioral consistency

Inconsistency reasons: situational factors, victim behavior/selection, location, maybe just not consistent, experimentation, first 3 crimes they may be experimenting/learning, 

Salfati Bateman 2007

Linkage Analysis Behaviors

4 useful behaviors

1 useful category

Core behaviors criteria

Linkage behaviors criteria

4: Crime kit, destroying evidence, oral sex by victim, ligature

1: Planning and control

Core behaviors were high frequency and high consistency

Linkage behaviors were low frequency and high consisntency - below 50%, above 80%

Sexually Violent Predator Laws (SVP)

What are they, what are the criteria

Laws to allow civil commitment for indefinite periods of time, supposedly to protect the community.

Criteria:

-Must have committed a sexually violent crime

-Have a mental abnormality/personality disorder that makes the person more prone to act in a sexually violent way (easy to argue because most criminals can fit APD)

-Causes problems controlling behavior so that

-They are likely to commit future offenses if not secured in a facility.

Usually given this when about to finish up prison term.

Model of pedophilia

Preconditions:

Predisposition to sexually abuse children

Overcome internal inhibitions (disinhibition) 

Overcome external inhibitions

Overcome child resistance strategies

Definintions: 

Emotional congruence: emotional needs are better met by children, emotionally relate more to children than adults

Blockage: relate more to children because unable to have needs met by adults or adults are less satisfying sexual partners

Sexual arousal: children are sexually arousing/gratifying object, predisposition to abuse these children

Implicit Theories

(Definition, Cognitive distortions definition, implicit theories specific to sex offenders)

Beliefs held about the world developed in early childhood that evolve as a person grows up, more general than cognitive distortions. Relate to how a person sees the world and interprets other people

Specific to sex offenders:

Distortions they hold about their victims--beliefs, desires

Used to infer victim's mental state, behavior, future mental state/behavior

Cognitive distortions: beliefs that come after the fact to rationalize/justify behavior. "I'm not a monster for abusing that child because..."

Children as sex objects - children are capable of desiring and enjoying sex

Entitlement - offender's desires are more important than anyone else and must be met

Dangerous world - 2 options - must fight to achieve dominance OR children are more trustworthy than adults 

Nature of harm - sex isn't harmful to children and is positive

Uncontrollability - impossible to control sexual urges and once feel those urges they must be met

-Entitlement - the offender's desires are more important than anyone else, if needs aren't met he has the right to rape

-Dangerous World - world is a dangerous place, must be on guard against exploitation

-Women are unknowable - women are fundamentally opposite from men, deceptive, and adversarial

-Women are sex objects - women always want sex, can't be injured by sex unless physically injured, women's body language is more honest than words

-Men's sex drive is uncontrollable - men can't control sex drive, once initiated, must be met or will build to dangerous levels

What implication does the finding that both expressive and instrumental crimes display elements of impulsivity and control have for theory?

Which study does this come from?

Categories aren't mutually exclusive, there are elements of both impulsivity and control in both kinds of crime scenes and the crime scenes themselves

Salfati 2003

Purpose: Evaluate the FBI assumption of what makes a good profiler using different groups representing different traits.

Results: Profilers did better than others. Psychologists did better than police, suggesting that psych knowledge is more important than experience.

Wanted to determine how profilers differ from other groups in assessments and background and profiles.

Not huge difference when look individually, but if you collapse all the non-profiler groups into one, the profilers did better. Psychologists were a close runner up.

Figure out whether homicides offenders and crime scenes could be classified as Instrumental or Expressive and whether offenders could be linked to crime scenes.

YES they could be classified. Majority of offenders were instrumental, majority of crime scenes were expressive. Linking crime scenes to offenders didn't work as well.

Used SSA

Wanted to evaluate how impulsive instrumental/expressive crimes were.

Instrumental and expressive both had the highest frequency crimes in very Impulsive ranges. The lower frequency behaviors were all more cognitive/controlled in single homicide. 

I/E crimes both show impulsive and controling behaviors, just different ones. Crimes were mixed with both impulsive and control even in the same crime.

Body hidden

body moved

Restrained

Weapon brought

Tortured

Antemortem sexual assault

Vaginal sex

Knife

Subgroup: Theft