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  • So where do we begin? How are we going to find the person who committed this crime?

  • Obviously, we could look at the results of any forensic tests, we could talk to eyewitnesses

  • and so on. But, forensic tests take time, and don't always provide a conclusive result.

  • They might only provide part of the information you need, and eyewitness accounts are not

  • always available.

  • Now, obviously in our case, we have some eyewitnesses, and we will return to consider eyewitness

  • evidence shortly in a future episode. But let's start by trying to identify the suspect

  • from what we know about the crime itself. This is called offender profiling, and one

  • famous example of profiling, is in the case of the Washington Snipers. Between the 2nd

  • and 22nd of October in 2002, 10 people were murdered and a further 3 wounded in Maryland,

  • Virginia and Washington, DC in the United States of America. All victims were shot at

  • a distance, with a single rifle shot, and every time the killers disappeared in amongst

  • the confusion that resulted.

  • The shootings appeared random. They took place in grocery store car parks, at petrol stations,

  • while victims were mowing their lawns or sitting reading a book. There was nothing to link

  • the victims. These shootings appeared for all intents and purposes to be random. Now

  • understandably these shootings caused fear and panic in the community. The pressure was

  • on to apprehend the culprit, but for investigators there wasn't really that much to go on.

  • Eyewitness accounts were few and often contained conflicting information. The media was incredibly

  • interested in this case and many were called on to give their opinion as to who it was

  • that was committing these crimes. Those who commented ranged from forensic psychologists,

  • to criminologists, to homicide detectives to self-taught and FBI trained criminal profilers.

  • These publicly available profiles, while far less detailed than would be developed in use

  • for a typical case, give us a unique opportunity to look at what the profilers said the culprit

  • or culprits would be like. And we can compare these descriptions with the known characteristics

  • of those who were subsequently caught and convicted of these crimes. So, if we limit

  • ourselves to just those profiles provided by self-professed profilers or FBI trained

  • profilers we can see that there are some inconsistencies in their comments. So on the topic of who

  • is the sniper, Pat Brown, who is a self-taught profiler and author, stated on CNN on October

  • 11, 2002, so at this stage 9 days and 9 shootings into this spate of criminal activity:

  • "This guy is a psychopath...He's involved in power control, and he might like Rambo movies, Arnold Schwarzenegger,

  • anything that gives him the feeling of power that he controls the universe."

  • Five days later on October 16, 2002, Candice DeLong, a retired FBI agent and field profiler,

  • was quoted in the New York Times as stating the following:

  • "I see him into all this stealth ninja stuff, walking around with a swagger, used to bossing people around, maybe a fireman or a construction worker."

  • So here we are starting to get a picture of what the perpetrator is like. And note that

  • both suggested that it is a single person committing these crimes. We are also starting

  • to get a hint of their possible occupation. Gregg McCrary, a former profiler and instructor

  • at the FBI Academy's profiling unit, is quoted in the Washington Post on October 23rd,

  • the day after what turned out to be the final shooting, as drawing on the demographic make

  • up of the Washington region to suggest the following:

  • "When you break down the demographics of the Washington region, there's a statistical probability that the sniper is a white man."

  • Now in terms of the geographical location of the perpetrator's home, Robert Ressler,

  • a former FBI profiler, commented on CNN on October 18, 2002 that:

  • "It is clear that this individual, and in my opinion, these individuals, were going to stay in the major metropolitan Washington area, which tells me that they're residents. These people are long-term residents."

  • Now note in this profile, Ressler makes it clear that he thinks that there is more than

  • one person involved in committing these crimes. And this is different to the assumptions

  • made by Brown, DeLong and McCrary in their profiles. Brown publicly disagreed with Ressler

  • and said on CBS on October 22, 2002:

  • "I have surmised from the beginning that he probably lives in the - somewhere about three miles from the Olney, Maryland area."

  • So from these few excerpts of the many profiles offered by trained and self-taught profilers

  • we can see there are inconsistencies. The same information has not led to an agreed

  • on perspective of the probable characteristics of the offender. For example, in this case,

  • the profilers cannot agree if it is a single individual or multiple people or indeed where

  • that person or people are likely to live. And in fact, when you consider those caught

  • and convicted of these crimes - that is, John Muhammad, a 41 year old Gulf War veteran and

  • 17 year old John Lee Malvo, an immigrant from Jamaica, you can see that there are some other

  • issues in the profiles. For example, the assumption made on the ethnic make up of the Washington

  • region was that the perpetrator would be white. They were also not firemen or construction

  • workers, and no comment was ever made in regard to their love or otherwise of Rambo movies.

  • So why the mismatch?

  • Well perhaps we have biased our sample by only showing you those profiles that got

  • it wrong. It's a possibility, but there is nothing to suggest in the many articles

  • and books that have been written on this subject, that an accurate profile helped apprehend

  • the suspects. Rather, it seems in this case that a phone call from someone claiming to

  • be the shooter that linked these crimes to an earlier shooting, where a fingerprint had

  • been found and kept on file, was actually critical in solving this case.

  • Maybe the profiles offered differed because of the point at which they were made, that

  • is they were all made at different points in the sequence of the shootings, and possibly

  • more information about the characteristics of the shooter or shooters emerged as time

  • went on. And this is certainly true.

  • But there was a startling consistency in the way these crimes were committed, the modus

  • operandi if you like, that didn't seem to evolve over the course of the crime sequence.

  • It is also fair to say that at this point in time these were unusual crimes and so profilers,

  • like the police, really didn't have that much to go on. It is hard to comment on what

  • a perpetrator who commits this sort of crime is going to be like when you don't have

  • instances or examples where this sort of crime, or this type of sequence, has been seen before.

  • So now lets consider how profiling, in perhaps more typical crimes, might assist in investigations.

So where do we begin? How are we going to find the person who committed this crime?

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B1 中級 美國腔

1.1 犯罪特徵分析簡介 (1.1 Criminal Profiling Introduction)

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    kismet 發佈於 2021 年 01 月 14 日
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