“Criminal Minds: Art imitating life or just good TV?” Although criminal and offender profiling is useful to some extent as it does assist somewhat in police investigations there is a great lack of both scientific and empirical evidence to legitimise the science. Criminal profiling has gained considerable attention over the past three decades as a “tool for police investigations worldwide, an academic area of study and in the media” (Snook, Gendreau, Bennell, & Taylor, 2008). Television programs such as criminal minds have led to the common misconception that criminal profiling is a “reliable investigative source that is well practised” (Snook, Gendreau, Bennell, & Taylor, 2008) that can be used to accurately identify criminals. Since its inception in 1888, criminal profiling has been a vastly discussed subject and research has been performed but at this stage the lacking evidence does not provide much usefulness. At present criminal profiling is a developing and unreliable science lacks both scientific and empirical foundations. Academics such as Dern, et al “state that criminal profiling is topical and a highly successful and estimated approach to identifying criminals” but the typologies and techniques used suggest otherwise. Its vague nature creates notable difficulty in establishing reliable, robust and valid classification schemes (Canter, 2004). For example the need to identify salient features of crimes (Canter and Young, 2003 as cited in Canter, 2004) is important as prior to the formulation of scientific theories and arguments profilers need to identify the behaviourally important features of a crime that are relevant to the offender. This process is complex and difficult to establish a clearly identified schema as most findings are based on empirical data. An additional problem to developing these typologies is the trouble establishing a consistent approach that can be applied to all crimes. This is important as behaviours and tendencies need to be identified in order to apply a definite typology to critically evaluate the profile. Many of these techniques rely on the notion that all offenders and crimes are consistent which is highly unreasonable assumption (Woodhams, Hollin, & Bull, 2007). Humans are complex and cannot be relegated to a certain group characteristics. Although there may be an identifiable theme running throughout their crimes, variation and change are inevitable and natural faucets of the human condition. It is for this reason that techniques used for criminal profiling must be constantly reviewed and updated. In Germany, where criminal profiling or behavioural case analysis is a highly used tool “they regularly assess the reliability of methods, to identify shortcomings and to develop amendment strategies”. This infers the academics identify that profiling is an ambiguous science that must be continually monitored and developed. Linking crimes then becomes difficult as this theory was founded on those of salience and consistanc. Where there is no forensic evidence ie blood or fingerprints the question of whether crimes can be linked through characteristics of the crime scene Issues of classification The reliability of criminal profiling can also be questioned when considering those who are qualified as a profiler. Many commentators have suggested that there is no clear distinction between those who have ‘trained’ as criminal profilers and the average layperson (Gudjonsson, Copson, 1997 as cited in Snook, et al. 2008) as “profilers have also failed to show that their training improves their ability to develop an accurate profile” (Snook, Eastwood, et al., 2007 as cited in Snook, et al. 2008). Dern et al states that many profilers claim their skills and knowledge have been acquired through either theoretical or practical training. Those who attach their ability to theoretical training claim that their “formal scientific education has allowed them to identify relationships between crime details and personality”. Those who claim to have theoretical training state that most of the experience comes from time in the field and the wisdom gained from analysing crime scenes. Although both approaches are considered legitimate neither demonstrate a difference to someone who has not had any training thus failing to show that their training improves their ability to develop accurate profiles. Snook, et al also note that although there has been attempts to “regulate and accredit profilers” there is no official institution to control those who claim to be criminal profilers, resulting in profilers with varied levels of experience and education.
