Criminal Profiling and Public Safety

On a bitterly cold January morning in 1974, a man crept up to a house in Wichita, Kansas. When he departed, four beautiful people, two adults and two children, were dead. The killing did not stop there. The BTK strangler, as he called himself, went on to destroy many more innocent lives during the following years.

Those of us who grew up in the area speculated about the kind of person this killer could be. Was he a loner? Most, including professional investigators, guessed he most likely was.

We were wrong. I was among those who assumed this serial killer would be unable to have a relationship with anyone, and would not be married and certainly would not have children of his own. I was right about some other aspects--namely his narcissism, his sociopathic personality, level of intelligence and general appearance-but was entirely wrong about his home life.

When BTK/Dennis Rader was finally caught, 31 years after the first murders, he had a wife, a steady job, had been active in a local boy scouts troop, had raised two children, and was president of his Lutheran congregation.

I am only using this case as one example of how the public can be fooled and how dangerous it can be to make assumptions about serial killers based merely on stereotypes. Rader is an excellent example of the psychopath who eludes capture by hiding in plain sight. Although many who had the misfortune of knowing him disliked him, he did not fit the stereotype of the deranged derelict. Had Rader's tremendous ego not led him to begin sending taunting letters again (and evidence from the crimes), it is possible the murders would have gone unsolved forever.

Care should be taken when distributing a criminal profile to the public. I strongly believe the general public should receive any information that might lead to important tips; it is important, however, that assumed details such as "not married" or "married" not be enforced too heavily or people may overlook the serial killer next door, with the nice wife and two kids.

There is no doubt that criminal profiling can provide incredibly important clues. Details of the crime scene and method of attack can show a well-trained profiler whether a killer was organized or disorganized and give other clues to the mental state of the violent criminal, for instance, but profiling is not an exact science (this is not to say that profiling is not a very important part of an investigation).

A statement to the public, "We believe this person gained entry to the home by posing as a telephone repairman," can facilitate public safety. The public needs to be made aware if a violent offender is using a ruse to gain access to victims. However, a statement such as, "This person probably never received a diploma and likely lives alone," is interesting but can slow investigations by prematurely narrowing the range of suspects.

Well-known criminal profiler, Pat Brown, has stated that there is no way to accurately determine just how many serial killers there are in the United States, but that the number is likely much higher than most people think. There are several reasons we are unable to determine how many there may be. Serial killings by their very nature (as stranger on stranger killings) are more difficult to solve than your average crime of passion or other kinds of homicides in which the victim is related to the suspect in some manner.

As I stated earlier, I believe another factor is that many are able to hide well in plain sight --not just because they had no prior dealings with the victim but because, like Rader, they don't fit the image. There are indeed serial killers who fit the public's stereotype-Gary Hilton is a good example. They are the deranged creeps living alone in that house on the corner or, in Hilton's case, a van. But there are probably just as many, or more, serial killers who appear average enough to blend in well with society.