Top down approach

• Offender profiling


  = Investigative strategy used by forensic psychologists to identify likely suspects.

  • Help investigator accuracy and predict the profile and characteristics of unknown offenders.
  • Ideas about their background, relationship patterns, personality and job.
• Top-down approach= use typologies, expertise and intuition of profiler to create profile.
• Top-down approach

  = Profilers start with a pre-established typology and work down to lower levels in order to assign offenders to one of two categories based on witness accounts and evidence from the crime scene.

  • FBI drew upon data gathered from in depth interviews with 36 sexually motivated murderers including Ted Bundy and Charles Manson.
  • They concluded data could be categorised into organised or disorganised crimes.
  • Each category has certain characteristics so in the future data from crime scenes matched with some of the characteristics we could predict other likely characteristics.
• Organised offenders

  = Show evidence of having planned the crime in advance. The victim is deliberately targeted and this suggests the offender has a 'type' of victim.

  • Maintain a high degree of control during crime and operate with almost detached surgical precision.
  • Little evidence or clues left at crime scene.
  • Tend to be above average intelligence, in a skilled, professional occupation, socially and sexually competent, monitors media coverage.
  • Usually married, some with children, higher birth order.
• Disorganised offenders

  = Show little evidence of planning, suggesting their offences may be spontaneous.

  • Crime scene reflects the impulsive nature of attack- body is usually left at the scene, very little control.
  • Tend to have lower-than-average IQ, be in unskilled or unemployed work.
  • Tend to have a history of sexual dysfunction and failed relationships.
  • Tend to live alone relatively close to the crime scene.
• Constructing an FBI profile

  1 data assimilation- profiler reviews evidence  

  2. crime scene classification- organised or disorganised

  3 crime reconstruction- hypothesis in terms of sequence of events, behaviour of the victim.

  4 profile generation- hypothesis related to the likely offender.
• Robert Ressler 7 considerations 


  1. Murder type-patterns, methods, timings. Eg: serial, spree or mass murderer.
  2. Primary intent- motivation, pre-meditation.
  3. Offender risk- degree to which the offender exposes themselves.
  4. Escalation- crimes becoming more brutal.
  5. Time factors- daily routine or activity.
  6. Location factors- transport, home.
  7. Victim risk- vulnerability of potential victims, low risk targets.
• Evaluation- research support for organised category

  Test organised/disorganised typology. Canter analysed 100 US murders each committed by a different serial killer. Technique called smallest space analysis used= statistical technique that identifies correlations across different samples of behaviour.

  • Analysis used to assess the co-occurrence of 39 aspects of serial killings. (Whether torture or restraint, attempt to conceal body, murder weapon used, cause of death)
  • Revealed that there is a subset of features of many serial killings which matched the FBI typology for organised offenders.
• Evaluation- counterpoint

  = Many studies suggest that the organised and disorganised types are not mutually exclusive. There are a variety of combinations that occur at any given murder scene.

  • Godwin argues that in reality it is difficult to classify killers as one or the other type. A killer may have multiple contrasting characteristics, such as high intelligence and sexual competence but commits a spontaneous murder leaving the victims body at the crime scene.
  • Suggests the organised/disorganised typology is probably more of a continuum.
• Evaluation- wider application

  Strength= can be adapted to other kinds of crime, like burglary.

  • Critics of top-down profiling have claimed the technique only applies to a limited number of crimes. Eg: sexually motivated murder.
  • Meketa reports that top-down profiling has recently been applied to burglary, leading to a 85% rise in solved cases in 3 US states.
  • The detection method retains the organised/disorganised distinction but also adds two new categories: interpersonal (offender knows victim and steals something) and opportunistic.
  • Suggests top-down profiling has wider application.
• Evaluation- flawed evidence

  FBI profiling developed using interviews with 36 murderers in the US. 25 serial and 11 single or double murders.

  • At end of process, 24 were classified as organised and 12 disorganised. 
  • Canter argued the sample was poor- didn't select a random or large sample and sample didn't contain different kinds of offender.
  • No standard set of questions so each interview was different and therefore not comparable.
  • suggests top-down profiling doesn't have a sound, scientific basis.