Top-down approach

• Offender profiling

  The idea that the characteristics of an offender can be deduced from the characteristics of the offence
• Types of offender profiling

  • The top-down approach
  • The bottom-up approach
• Top-down approach

  Emerged in the 1970s as a result of work carried out by the FBI
• Top-down approach

  1. FBI Behavioural Science Unit interviewed 36 murderers

  2. Used the resulting data to create a classification system

  3. Distinguishes between organised and disorganised offenders

  4. Evidence collected from a crime scene can be used to classify the offender

  5. Classification informs the subsequent police investigation