Intro to Psychology of Crime: How successful is the practice of offender profiling in criminal justice? PDF

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Psychology of crime course work: How successful is the practice of offender profiling in criminal justice?...

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Hannah Rees – N0796550 How successful is the practice of offender profiling in criminal justice? Offender profiling was first introduced in the 19th century when Jack the Ripper was evading the police. It involves looking at clues to work out the likely characteristics of the offender, from their physical appearance to where they live. When discussing offender profiling we must acknowledge the use of both types: FBI style and statistical. FBI style profile analysis involves looking for clues at the crime scene to make intuition-based predictions about the offender. This includes gathering data, classification of the crime scene (organised or disorganised), crime scene reconstruction and finally profile generation. Investigators will look for the Modus Operandi to help create a picture of the offender. An example of when this worked was in the case of George Metesky also known as the ‘mad bomber’ who was eventually caught for his crimes due to FBI style profiling correctly predicting his characteristics. Some of the predictions made about Metesky included: he would be unmarried, self-educated, middle aged and reside in Connecticut, all of which turned out to be true and eventually led to Metesky’s arrest in January 1957. However, Canter had a number of issues with FBI style profiling. Firstly, he believed it had too much reliance on experience and intuition which are subjective giving it a weak empirical basis. He also said that it focuses on the bizarre types of crime such as murder, leaving it useless when bringing about criminal justice for less serious crimes. A further weakness of FBI style profiling is the fact that it requires specialist training of professionals. This would mean using police’s valuable resources, including money and time, where they could be used elsewhere. It is also a very tedious process and it involves weeding through a large amount of information to be of any use. Moreover, FBI style profiling is seen with scepticism by many, such as Torres, Boccaccini and Miller. They found that many professionals believed profiling was a useful tool in law enforcement and criminal justice [3]. Statistical or actuarial profiling on the other hand, takes an approach based on trends and research findings; mainly attributed to David Canter. This helps to make a profile of the offender by finding patterns in crime scene that may link to characteristics of the offender. This is, arguably, a more empirical approach due to the use of statistical analysis techniques such as smallest space analysis [2]. This works by plotting the relationship between crime scene characteristics on a diagram or graph. The crime scene characteristics that happen at the same time most frequently are closer together on the graph; with the most common in the middle and the least common at the outside. This makes it easier for the researcher to identify the coexisting characteristics. One piece of evidence to support actuarial profiling is the John Duffy case. He was a serial rapist who carried out 24 sexual attacks in London in the 1980s. Canter analysed the geographical details using smallest space analysis and drew up a surprisingly accurate profile. However, it should be noted that the profile did not directly lead to his arrest. [4] On the other hand, there is much evidence for statistical profiling to be useless as well as the fact that it can lead to miscarriages of justice. For example, Paul Britton’s misleading profile in the hunt for the killer of Rachel Nickell. A further weakness of this is the fact that, like FBI

style profiling, it requires specialist training to ensure smallest space analysis is being used to its full potential. Furthermore, although using statistics can be useful in narrowing down the profile of the offender, it has little use when used on its own. This is because every case is different and you can never be sure that they will mirror each other; thus, leading to wrongly convicting innocent people. To conclude, offender profiling can be useful in helping to convict offenders but it must not be used along to ensure the right person is being sentenced. Actuarial profiling can be seen as more useful due to its empirical basis and the amount of success it has had in the past. It is widely used in the UK whereas FBI style profiling is used more frequently in the USA, giving the impression that both have their merits but the argument for statistical profiling being more useful is stronger due to FBI style being more heavily based on assumptions. Referencing List [1] Howitt D, 2015, 275, Introduction to Forensic and Criminal Psychology, 5th Edn, Pearson. [2] Howitt D, 2015, 291, Introduction to Forensic and Criminal Psychology, 5th Edn, Pearson. [3] Howitt D, 2015, 303, Introduction to Forensic and Criminal Psychology, 5th Edn, Pearson. [4] Canter D, Youngs D, 2016, Principles of Geographical Offender Profiling, 2nd Edn, Ashgate Publishing, New York....