Lecture 7

Question 1

what is the myth about what BIA do

Answer 1

• Most depiction based pn American models
• Only x1 BIA in the uk actually used to be a police officer
• TV shows say that they do everything + with a quick turnover
  o In reality senior investigator main person in saying what people do, everyone reports to them
  o Multidisciplinary team
   Only one BIA
   Also BI, forensic analyssr, forensic psychologist

Question 2

what is the reality about what BIAs do - ainsworth

Answer 2

• “At the heart of most profiling is the belief that characteristics of an offender can be deducted by a careful and considered examination of the characteristics of the offence”

Question 3

what is the reality about what BIAs do

Answer 3

• Cannot identify who committed the crime, can suggest probable characteristics an offender may possess
• Use data bases of offenders  picture of what type of people police for look for – to tell us wht type of person committed the offense
• Use data from the crime scene
• BIA can’t act as an expert witness, can only assist by providing info which can assist their search  not 100% who did it

Question 4

what types of psychology is involved in forensic psych

Answer 4

• Forensic psychology applies other areas of psychology to the forensic domain and criminal justice system
  o Eg cognitive, developmental, social

Question 5

describe the history behind : EWT, aggression, personality, social interactions, scripts

Answer 5

Offenders may have scripts in their head about how they ant the murder/ rape to occur
Doesn’t always fo to plan
Can use what went wrong and right to identify , by default, what behvaiours occur after this
Gives us ideas of what type of person they are

Question 6

describe the history behind : Dr Brussel 1956

Answer 6

o Argue the 1st type of BIA
 Debate over whether he had ‘special powers’ or was influential
• He came up with ideas of social classes
• Originally got it right then not so much

Question 7

describe the history behind : FBI

Answer 7

o Set up a BA analysis unit + researched the background behind it
o Quantico
 Investigated the dichotomy of organised/disorganised crimes and their set of features

Question 8

describe the history behind : experience

Answer 8

o Paul + david canter –. Gave advice on investigations in the UK
o Still an academic debate about experience vs research

Question 9

how did BIA move on fom profiling

Answer 9

• Not just profiling, assist investigative decision making

- Consultants from NCA invited to assist investigation

Question 10

why are - Murder, rape, abduction, arson, suspicious missing persons usually the focus of BIAs

Answer 10

o Why focus = seriousness of offense and risk it causes
o Psychology = study of human behavior
o Robbery = not many ways to commit this
 But rape/ murder etc have many variables/ decisions that offender can choose to make
• These provide clues bout the person
o Murder/ rape has the most behaviourlly rich data

Question 11

why do BIAs only look at cases when the criminal is unknown

Answer 11

o Only use BIA when the offender is unknown (which is rare, which is why rarely used as most are done by people who are known)

Question 12

what services are offered by BIAs

Answer 12

crime scene assessments 
profiling 
offence linkage 
interview stratergy 
media stratergy

Question 13

describe what happens during a crime scene assessment

Answer 13

• Particularly om murder investigations
• Focus on behavioural interaction between offender and the victim
• Consider all of the possible hypothoses
  o Then test the null hypos to discount them

Question 14

describe what happens during a crime scene assessment; - The Interactive Offence

Answer 14

o Complex social interaction
o -Many factors impact upon offender
o -Offender has some control over how to re/act and characteristic re/actions remain consistent
o All have to come together for offense to occur
o Some say only thing of total control over the victim is when the offender first interacts with them
 Then after that depends on how the victim acts

Question 15

describe Prioritisation of persons of interest for DNA intelligence led screening

Answer 15

• Using features to decide what to prioritise looking for
• Swab people with the highest scores which co-oberate with the matrix, for dna
• Picture = simplistic example of how profiling developed into BI advice

Question 16

what happens during offense linkage

Answer 16

• Difference BIA and analyst re linkage – doing in seminar BIA given set of cases – opinion whether linked, analysts IDENTIFY potential cases which are similar from a huge database of offences.

Question 17

why is offence linkage used

Answer 17

• Telling us whether it is different offenders or the same on  from offence similarities + differences
  o But we know from behaviourism that we learn each time we do something so would never be the same offence each time
• Can give explanations for differences  eg offence 4 didn’t move to nother location, but may have already been an optimal initial locatoion compared to the other scenes
• Compare the linkage to the base rate

Question 18

why are BIAs used during the interview stratergy

Answer 18

• Eg psychopaths = high IQ/ risk taking/ charming/ no empathy
  o Won’t care about the victims and the families
• Not about manipulation but about not wasting time and getting info as quick as poss

Question 19

why are BIAs used duringthe media stratergy

Answer 19

• Give advice to the media to aid memory recall  cognition
  o Anchors to remind recll
  o Can use significance in media to get and give out right type of info
  o Wont give out height/ build as we know these are poor from recall

Question 20

what are the steps to the method for BIAs

Answer 20

Step 1: Data Collection
Step 2: Analysis to Inference- Three Elements of Crime
Step 3: Assimilation and Action

Question 21

what happens in step one for BIAs

Answer 21

• What is required – terms of reference
• Statements, briefing, crime scene visit
• What happened in this interaction > collection of physical evidence
  o What want, what info need, when want by, cisit crime scene (ususally done at the time of day it occurred)

Question 22

what is problematic about the data in step 1

Answer 22

o Access
o Retrospective – memory and cognitive bias’ – limited quality and quantity
o Not collected for purpose of behavioural interpretation
o Samples skewed to those worked with, caught, researched etc.
o Based on existing date (messy)

Question 23

what happens in step 2 for the BIAs

Answer 23

• Location: type, selection-familiar, escape
• Victim: routine, risk, personality
  o Why this specific victim has been selected
• Offender: aggression, weapon, injuries, items missing
  o Decisions that offender made
  o Actual CS + routes off took  to understand decisions
  o Some things victim led

Question 24

what 3 types of technical experience is needed in step 2 for the BIAs

Answer 24

clinical
statistical
research

Question 25

explain clinical experience/ technique needed for step 2

Answer 25

- Case study experience with similar individuals/cases - Diagnostic: - “I knew how this killer functioned; I knew what drove him, because I had seen the same impulse in other people I’d interviewed and treated over the years.”

Question 26

explain statistical experience/ technique needed for step 2

Answer 26

- Database comparison of previous offenders/offences | - “Looking at similar offences held on the database, 72% of offenders were strangers to the victim.”

Question 27

explain research experience/ technique needed for step 2

Answer 27

- Research into offenders/offences e.g. personality, behaviour themes - “Consider … the seemingly obvious conclusion that Duffy was out of a job because he attacked during working hours. A general analysis of solved cases to see if offenders with jobs tend to attack at different times from those without would be one step in testing the robustness of even such an ‘obvious’ inference.”

Question 28

what happens in step 3 for the BIAs

Answer 28

- What does this tell us about the offender? Extreme violence=extremely violent? - Use knowledge and research from variety of sources - To provide evidence based, written report – fully backed rationale o Backing up inferences with research + write everything down in a report

Question 29

is the work by the BIAs any good ? --> underlying principles

Answer 29

- Consistency – is there consistency between offences, and in crime scene and everyday behaviour? o (Bouhana, Johnson & Porter, 2016; Mokros & Alison, 2002; Salfati & Bateman, 2005) o Making assumptions about consistency between offenders - Homology – do offenders committing similar offences have similar backgrounds? o (Mokros & Alison, 2002) o Just because killed someone in 1 way, does it mean they are of the same age/ ethnicity - Predicting socio-demographics rather than traits? o (Alison et al, 2003) o Is it feasible to predict socio-demographic info some behavior o As opposed to predicting behavior eg personality

Question 30

is the work by the BIAs any good ? practical considerations

Answer 30

- Small part, of a small number of investigations - Data problematic (memory, purpose, lie) - Court – “information about the past behaviour of other individuals is wholly irrelevant” o Sheldon & MacLeod, 1991, p814 o Cant act as expert witnesses in data

Question 31

is the work by the BIAs any good ?does it work

Answer 31

- “A profiler who gets it wrong may be responsible for many hours of wasted police time…it is essential that anything that is done in the name of profiling is subject to scrutiny and testing” - Ainsworth, 2001:153 - Important that correct as time/ future victims relie on BIA

Question 32

is the work by the BIAs any good ? positive findings?

Answer 32

FBI (1985) 64 murder scenes to 6 profilers, 80% congruence BUT dichotomous categorisation (Oleson, 1996) But FBI used organised dichotomuy (50/50 chance of getting it right anywy) Profilers wrote richer and more accurate sexual profiles compared to detectives Pinizzotto and Finkel, 1990) -Advice rated highly (Jackson, van den Eshof & de Kleuver, 1997) 77% success in focusing investigation (Pinizzotto, 1984)

Question 33

is the work by the BIAs any good ?Need for improvement

Answer 33

- Not yet acceptable (Canter and Alison, 1999) - Too vague (Ainsworth, 2001) - Common sense (Ainsworth, 2001) - Conclusions overstated (Polythress, Otto, Darkes & Starr, 1993) - Neither reliable nor valid (Polythress et al, 1993) - Not discriminatory (Grubin and Gunn, 1990)

Question 34

is the work by the BIAs any good ?Satisfaction surveys

Answer 34

- (Gudjonsson & Copson, 1997) - Argue that identifying the offender isn’t the role  role is prioritisation not identification - Only large scale investigations - Views of police towards investigations - Now = opens more lines of enquiry to look in more areas for evidence

Question 35

is the work by the BIAs any good ? accuracy

Answer 35

- How test accuracy e.g. motive – especially if never caught - How accurate is accurate – probability If 80% correct=accurate? (Ainsworth, 2001) - Accurate information does not necessarily mean it is helpful – bed-wetter - Should it even be tested for accuracy X done for probability (but obvious outliers) - If recommend 12 features and one is wrong does this mean its inaccurate o Or 5 wrong - Accurate advice emay not actually assist investigation (eg lives with aunts)

Question 36

is the work by the BIAs any good ? method

Answer 36

- Are conclusions well reasoned and supported? - Significant improvements - "presents material in a more coherent and evidence-based format” Almond et al, 2007:1 - "These professionals have indeed developed an expertise in their discipline” Knabe-Nicol, Alison and Rainbow, 2011:78

Question 37

is the work by the BIAs any good ? results from Gudjonsson & Copson, 1997

Answer 37

``` identified offender - 3% assisted solving case- 14% new lines of enquiry- 16% reassured own judgement- 52% furthered understanding of offender- 61% operationally useful -83% ```

Question 38

is the work by the BIAs any good ? method- Are conclusions well reasoned and supported?

Answer 38

o Reasoning process Alison et al, 2003, 2005; Almond et al, 2007 Strength of an argument by examining: •claim the murderer is under 30 years •grounds because this is a murder of a 23 year old female •warrant the majority of murderers of females under 25 years are under 30 years old •backing or rational research by XXX, or data from XXX database •modality or strength there is an 87% chance that… •rebuttals unless other indications…

Question 39

is the work by the BIAs any good ? method- - Significant improvements - "presents material in a more coherent and evidence-based format” Almond et al, 2007:1

Answer 39

o Expertise Knabe-Nicol & Alison, 2011; Knabe-Nicol, Alison & Rainbow, 2011 Interviews/observations •Selective focussing on salient information •Identification of anomalies •Grouping behaviours into themes •Attention to detail and holistic analysis •Common mistakes demonstrates expertise Distinct from novices who may miss information/ too much attention to irrelevant/unhelpful parts (cross)