Allyson Lambros
Professor Tougas
Research Essay
May 8, 2013
How to Stereotype Ethically
The ethical dilemmas that criminal profilers face are many and varied. From how to
handle the pressures of the media to maintaining a strong sense of personal responsibility,
profilers are constantly dealing with moral problems. But there is one issue in particular that
profilers face that is causing mayhem in all aspects of the justice system: forensic fraud. Forensic
fraud is exactly what it sounds like and can be committed in various ways, from tampering with
evidence to lying on the stand. This problem is one that has forced hundreds of cases to be
thrown out of court, as well as caused the deaths of innocent lives. In order to stop this flagrant
misuse of power, two things need to be improved. First, there needs to be better peer and
supervisor leadership; and second, more training and education need to be given to criminal
profilers in order to show them just how influential they can be and how that influence, when
abused, can be deadly.
Criminal profilers are often elevated to a level of near-inscrutability, thanks largely to
television dramas, popular movies and media hype. They are depicted as men and women who
know more about our minds than we do, who can predict the future and catch a killer based only
on the fact that he loves Mozart. But the reality is that criminal profilers are very much human,
victim to the same human flaws that the rest of us mere mortals are susceptible to. The evidence
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of this lies in case file after case file of substandard and downright disturbing case work,
providing all the evidence needed to show that something in the system needs to change.
One such case involved a man named Richard Jewell, a security guard at the 1996
Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, who became an instant celebrity after a bomb exploded in
Centennial Olympic Park during his early morning shift on July 27, 1996. The explosion killed
one woman, injured 111 people and would have done more damage had not Jewell, who was
working a temporary job as a guard, spotted the abandoned green backpack that contained the
bomb, called it to the attention of the police, and started moving visitors away from the area
(Sack, C13). He was praised for his quick thinking and actions at the time for presumably saving
many lives.
Then everything changed three days after the incident when a newspaper reported that
Jewell had become the FBI’s top suspect, a change that occurred because Jewell fit the profile of
a bomber; a single man, living with his mother who loved police work but wasn’t actually in the
force, giving himself the chance to play the hero by saving everyone from a bomb he himself had
planted (Turvey, 720). As it turned out, Jewell really was just a hero, and the case against him
was dropped by the FBI, but not before Jewell’s name was smeared through the mud and his
reputation was ruined. He eventually won lawsuits against CNN and NBC for libel, and felt
justified when the real culprit was caught in 2005, but his life was never the same (Kohn).
All of this case’s grief, embarrassment and waste of time and resources came about
because an FBI agent leaked information to the press regarding a psychological profile that
indicated that Jewell was a likely suspect (Turvey, 720). The FBI had been forming a plan of
action to interview Jewell when the story broke, but with such a highly public case on their hands
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and a suspect being persecuted relentlessly by the media and the rest of the world, the FBI had
no choice but to hit Jewell hard, even when it became clear that he wasn’t their man. This is a
clear example of a profile being used in an unethical and damaging way, one which confused the
investigation and led to the slandering of an innocent man.
But while Richard Jewell serves as an example of how solid, honest profiles (when
leaked) can harm others, his case doesn’t show how criminal profilers themselves can commit
forensic fraud. As Turvey notes, “Criminal profilers engage in forensic fraud when they provide
sworn testimony, opinions, or reports bound for court that contain deceptive or misleading
findings, opinions, or conclusions, deliberately offered to secure an unfair or unlawful gain,”
(Turvey, 612). These, he continues, can be put into three different classifications: simulators,
pseudoexperts, and dissemblers. Simulators manipulate physical evidence, pseudoexperts
embellish their credentials for gain – but it is the dissembler, the profiler who lies or otherwise
twists his or her actual findings in a case, no matter the reason, that truly exemplifies the moral
dilemma at hand.
It is in the FBI’s botched siege of the Branch Davidian property at Mount Carmel in
Waco, Texas, in 1993a profiler’s ethical responsibilities (and the consequences of not holding to
them) are clearly seen. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) had
originally gone to the Mount Carmel property to issue warrants related to firearms violations that
the religious sect had committed (Kennedy). The mission ended in the deaths of four agents and
an unknown number of religious members and the intervention of the FBI. A 51 day long
stakeout ensued, with criminal profilers being consulted around the clock for opinions as to what
the cult’s leader, David Koresh, might do to his followers inside the compound. In four memos
written between March 3 and March 8, 1993, the lead criminal profiler on the case, Peter
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Smerick, cautioned against attempting to breach the compound. However, in a fifth and final
memo written on March 9, Smerick lost his non-confrontational approach due to the pressure
that he later claimed his superiors were putting on him to change his tone which would allow
them to use more forceful tactics. This pressure led to that fifth memo “contain[ing] subtle
changes in tone and emphasis that amounted to an endorsement of a more aggressive approach
against the Davidians,” (Moore). The highly publicized and drawn out standoff eventually made
its way to the desks of the FBI director and then President Bill Clinton, who used the case notes
(and, more to the point, Smerick’s final memo) to make the decision to use tear gas on the
compound and to ram a tank against the side of the building. Six hours later, Koresh gave his
followers the order to set the compound – and themselves – ablaze in a mass suicide that ended
in at least 51 deaths (the exact number of those who perished is still in question due to falsified
population records made by Koresh).
In this second case, we see the true power that a profiler’s opinion can hold. Rightly or
wrongly, criminal profilers have attained an almost mythical status in their ability to predict
human behavior. This respect, however, comes at the price of jealousy and resentment from both
fellow workers and superiors alike, with the age old issue of peer pressure coming front and
center. The Waco case demonstrates that no matter the potential personal costs an unfavorable
profile might invoke, the potential loss of life is a far greater one to pay.
Now that we have conclusively determined that something is rotten in Denmark, we can
turn our attention towards creating a solution to the problem. One such possibility lies in giving
new criminal profilers more training and education about moral dilemmas and what to do in
certain ethically challenging situations. This option is often attacked as being futile; after all, by
the time most recruits will have reached the FBI they will have already developed a moral
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compass, one which a twenty week course won’t be likely to change. But it is equally true that
studies have shown that “most adults determine proper behavior, as well as the moral
implications of those actions, after they observe other group members,” (Fitch, Brian D.). This is
especially true when adults find themselves in new situations, such as an unfamiliar city or a new
job, making the twenty week long training program for new recruits a perfect time to drive home
to them the importance of ethical behavior.
Some might argue that this type of training is already being done. After all, it says right
on the FBI’s website that “students tour the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington,
D.C. to learn what can happen when law enforcement loses its core values,” as part of their
ethics training (New Agents). But not only is a day trip to the Holocaust museum insufficient in
terms of time spent on the subject of morality, it is also not nearly specific enough to the issues
faced by criminal profilers to be of any use to them later on in their careers. Those recruits
looking to become profilers need more information on what happens when they stray from their
ethical roots in order to prevent temptation from affecting their better judgment, and an
additional course on ethics would do just that.
While a class would help recruits to understand the importance of the role that they are
taking up, opponents to this course of action would cynically argue that one course of ethics,
however well placed, won’t be enough to stop all of the forensic fraud that is taking place in the
world of criminal profiling – and they would be right. As demonstrated by the obedience tests
conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram in the 1960s, most people will do
something simply because an authority figure tells them to (McLeod, Saul). This is partially seen
in the Waco case: Smerick is pressured into changing his memo by his superiors and, though he
holds out for some time, he eventually acquiesces to their request. While this phenomenon was
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initially studied by Milgram to examine the justifications for the act of genocide, the same
psychological principles apply to Smerick’s case: because an authority figure demanded that it
be done, the action is completed with minimal guilt, the just-following-orders subconscious band
aid. Milgram’s findings make it clear that most people look to others for moral guidance,
especially when they are in unfamiliar situations. As Dr. Brian Fitch aptly notes, “for law
enforcement leaders, the lesson is clear – with ethics, most officers need to be led, and the formal
and informal leaders who provide this guidance play a critical role in officers’ moral
development and conduct,” (Fitch, Brian D.). These leaders need to be carefully screened and
groomed for the positions that they are to take up. They will be representing the Bureau not only
to the public but also to those they lead within the agency; they must hold themselves to a higher
standard, or risk losing the FBI’s ethical standard as a whole.
In conclusion, criminal profilers and those that work alongside them must always be
diligently aware of the risks and flaws that are associated with the imperfect form of profiling.
Though highly trained and skilled, profilers are in the end simply very good at stereotyping the
bad guys. And right though they often are, it is humanity’s nature to be inexplicable and
unpredictable. There is no such thing as a perfect system, and we must always be cautious when
using our own – especially when so much is at stake.
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