Forensic Psychology

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Important note: This whole section has been compiled from books and websites, with occasional help from people working in this field. Like the rest of Deep Background (of which this is only a small part), this information is designed for writers of X-Files fiction, and covers only those things that they might be expected to need. It is not a comprehensive guide to the subject.

Forensic Psychiatry

Forensic psychiatrists work with prisoners and criminals to assess their mental condition, treatment, and whether they are fit to plead or to be released. Presumably this is what Dr Aaron Monte was in "Tooms", when he recommended Tooms's release.

In particular, they establish:

Is the defendant fit to plead? To be found competent to stand trial, the defendant must show that they can actually understand the charge and have a basic ability to understand what is going on in the legal process. Forensic psychiatrists have training in the law to help them assess this.
Was the defendant mentally unstable at the time of the offense? The insanity plea can only be used if the defendant is competent to stand trial. Also, the instability must actually relate to the crime. If the mental defect didn't actually affect the crime, then it doesn't count.
Was the crime committed under "automatism"? For example, after an epileptic seizure sometimes people have no real awareness of where they are and afterwards can't remember what they did.

For the defendant to plead insanity he is admitting guilt - sauing that, yes, he did the crime, but here are the mitigating factors. If he makes this plea, he must be examined by a psychiatrist and can't refuse this.

Psychological Profiling

As we all know, this is what Mulder did before the X-Files.

Profiling is the term used for the process of examining all aspect of the crime scene in order to build up a picture of the sort of person who committed the crime. This picture can be remarkably complete, including sex, age, occupation, disorders, upbringing, marital status, home, type of car they drive etc. The profiler also can give information about how the crime was committed. It doesn't produce a name but it does produce information about the perpetrator which can be just as good as a name.

For further information, read "Mindhunter" by John Douglas.

The Investigative Support Unit

Mulder's former place of work is situated in the Academy, in a cramped maze of offices sixty feet beneath the indoor firing range, which used to be a nuclear fall-out shelter for the Director and his chief staff. It is part of the National Centre for the Analysis of Violent Crime. To get there you press "LL" on the elevator, or "Low-Low", as it's jokingly called. (This fact is also gleaned from a Patricia Cornwell novel). According to John Douglas, they sometimes call themselves the "National Cellar for the Analysis of Violent Crime" and joke that they are ten times deeper than dead people. It is sometime called the Behavioural Science Unit, or BSU. It is used as a service of last resort by all other law enforcement agencies, but it particularly used to catch serial killers.

There are 36 agents in this unit, but only 10 are full time profilers. The others work in VICAP, advise in hostage negotiations, appear in court as expert witnesses etc. They each work about 40 or 50 cases at once and work is constantly having to be turned down. About 11,000 cases are brought to them every year, though they only do about 800 full profiles.

Usually, they only accept cases that have gone unsolved for years. Even then, their profiles result in an instant arrest in about 5 percent of the cases.

Attitude of the FBI

Profiling starting in the FBI in the late 70s and wasn't taken seriously. The Behavioural Science Unit existed before then but it was mainly for teaching things such as hostage negotiation. It was only from about 1979 that they made a start on the idea that criminals would be profiled. To this end, there was a project of interviews with convicted criminals to build up a picture of the various motives and methods that criminals use. These were done between 1979 and 1983 and make up a large database of profiles and personality traits that can be drawn upon.

According to John Douglas, the recently retired head of the Behavioural Sciences Unit, the FBI seemed to regard what he was doing at this point as "a hobby". Although he kept updating the records on the criminal profiles, no-one seemed eager to use it. It as only by 1982 or 83, when he had had some sucesses working with local police, that the FBI began slowly to come round to the idea of using it.Even so, at the time Mulder was there, only about 50 percent of the FBI really approved of profiling.

Much depends on who's in charge at the moment, whether nationally, at the top of the FBI or in field offices. Some SACs in field officers are very supportive. Others, as Douglas says, say, "Forget it. It's too much like witchcraft."

Stress

"Grotesque" shows Patterson, and, in a way, Mulder, cracking under the strain of doing a profile. Does this really happen?

In the early 80s academic qualification such as a PhD were the main prerequisite of joining the BSU. However it was later found that personal qualifications were if anything more important. Profilers are chosen for their ability to cope with the huge workload and the type of work they do.

Nevertheless, as Douglas says, "no-one can ever really shrug it off." He talks about going for a walk in the park with your family, seeing an area of undergrowth and thinking what a wonderful place it would be to hide a body, then thinking back to the other bodies found in similar places. "We have people burning out from stress down here," he says. "There's too much work.... We work ridiculous hours in lousy space. We haven't the resources to take on any more people..."

As for Patterson's "becoming a monster" thing - this too is necessary. When talking to a killer, you can't go in all self- righteous and angry. You have to win his trust, and try as hard as you can to actually think like him. Profiler and killer can be seen sitting next to each other in a cell, laughing together at the details of some gruesome murder. The profiler mustn't get angry at what the killer has done, but must "get in these guy's shoes, laugh with them and think on their level."

"Victimology"

This is the key to most profiles. The profiler looks at the victim and the cime scene and from that works out the details of the victim's reaction during the crime. From that they move on to working out why the killer needed to see that particular response.

The Profile of a Violent Serial Offender

Usually some kind of neglect or abuse in childhood, although not necessarily physical abuse
Quite a few have been adopted
Not usually psychotic, although not necessarily normal. Very psychotic people are the ones who make mistakes and get caught after their first crime.
Craves power and domination.
Many have always been quiet and shy and have never achieved much - which is why they crave power and domination. For example, a sex offender probably feels he can't get a woman any other way, but if he forces himself on one then kills her he has possessed her utterly.
Often have, or had, ambitions to be a police officer, as this, in their mind, is an occupation of power and control, which is what they want. (Like Modell, in "Pusher", who applied to join the FBI) Many killers drive a car that is rather like whatever the local police drive (this is often put into profiles of killers). Sometimes they even drive a second-hand police car itself.
Vivid fantasy life. For example, one killer fantasied about getting rid of his abusive mother, so started acting out elements of this fantasy, starting with a doll, then animals, then humans, and finally his mother, whereupon the urge to kill was gone.
Transfers anger onto a different target. Displacement. This happens time and time again, as in the mother scenario above. Often they don't have the nerve to kill the person they're really angry with, so they kill others, maybe taking a trophy (like jewellery) from that person and giving it to the person they're angry with in order to show their control and power over that person. He can think "See? Look at that necklace? I could have killed her if I'd wanted to."
Don't kill on impulse. Think long and hard about what they're doing. It's the most important thing in their lives and they want to get it right.
Sometimes they want to be caught as it will make them famous and give them lots of attention. What's the point in killing lots of people really cleverly if no-one knows about it?
If the bodies are left obviously out in the open, it can be seen as taunting the community that the killer thinks rejected him.
Killers who take the time to dispose of the body well, such as in a river, are often older.
Vicious slashes on the sexual organs often show that the killer knew the victim.

Apart from these, much depends on the individual nature of the crime

It is necessary to move fast when faced with a serial killer. For the first few murders he's still refining his modus operandi. If you don't catch him then, it gets much harder.

Profilers divide murderers into two types, although some have aspects of both types in their personalities:

Organised killers:

This type of killer is often known as the psychopath.

High intelligence; socially and sexually competent; outgoing and articulate
Lives with someone
Likes to follow news of his crime, enjoying the feeling of superiority. Sometimes goes to where the police have coffee and listen to them talk. A few have been caught by agents putting a report into a newspaper saying "one year on, and such and such a crime is still unsolved." Reminded by this, the killer would go to the victim's grave and stand there going "I killed you, and they haven't found me, ha ha!" and was duly captured by agents staking the graveyard out.
Will sometimes kill again simply to keep his case in the news, and to keep people talking about him. Likes attention.
Often torture victims before death. Enjoys feeling of power this gives.
Often returns to the scene of the crime to gloat.
Plans crime, and targets a stranger. Likes to maintain control over everything - tortures victim, removes body from scene of death and disposes of it
May take souvenirs of the crime, including body parts.

Disorganised killers:

These killers are often schizophrenic

Average intelligence; socially immature; sexually incompetent
Lives alone
Poor work history
Doesn't follow crime in the news
Murder is spontaneous and usually of someone he knows, or in a place he knows. The killer is normally someone who lives close to the murders scene, or who knows the victim.
Crime scene is sloppy - body left where it fell, and weapon left too.
Violence is sudden - no torture before death, or restraints.
Often sexually asaults victim after death, or mutilates it. This often depends on age. Younger ones will often remove clothes and look at and touch the sexual organs but don't damage them. Older ones are more likely to do damage, such as attempt to "change the sex" of the victim. They feel threatened by, and fascinated by, sexual organs.

The Profile of a Bomber

In case anyone wants to include a bomber in their stories (and because I happened to find this information) here is Douglas's profile of a bomber:

Wants attention. It's an attention seeking way of doing a crime. Therefore he is likely to want to follow the press coverage of the bomb, so can perhaps be manipulated if you use the press yourself.
Intelligent. If you're an arsonist you just need to know how to use a match. To use a bomb you have to be brighter and know how to make one.
Somewhat courageous - the bomb could blow up in your face.
If there is a common denominator between victims then you can study that.
Not very sociable
Probably liked tinkering with devices when young. Maybe tried some practice bombs in the backyard. Can ask the public for information on this - though FBI not very willing to go public with such things.
Not insane. Hand-making bombs requires logical focus and hours of work
Like any killer, wants power and domination.

A nice snippet of information that I couldn't fit anywhere else:

A right-handed person, when asked a question, will usually look to the left if they are genuinely struggling to come up with the answer. If they look to the right, they may be lying.

And vice versa....

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