Top-down

• What is the Top-Down approach to offender profiling?

  • pre-determined theories/ideas are applied to data where profiler has experience and can use the evidence at the crime scene to develop a profile of the likely criminal
  • use the style of killing and information around when it was done to assess the killer psychologically
  • uses typology
• What are the types of offenders according to the top-down approach?

  Organised and Disorganised
• Organised offender crime scene:

  • planned crime
  • leave minimal evidence behind
  • brings weapons and/or restraints
  • victim's body moved or concealed
• Disorganised offender crime scene:

  • unplanned crime
  • chaotic crime scene with evidence left behind
  • improvised weapons from the crime scene location are used
  • random, disorganised behaviour
• Organised offender characteristics

  • high IQ
  • in a professional/skilled job
  • socially competent
  • follows media coverage of their crime
• Disorganised offender characteristics

  • low IQ
  • has low-skill job or is unemployed
  • socially incompetent
  • more likely to live near the crime scene
• Top-down approach evaluation:

  + practical application:

  • The TDA may be useful for identifying and apprehending murderers due to standardised template that can be applied

  - can only be used on sexually-motivated murders

  • model was based off of sample of sexually-motivated murderers
  • cannot be used for other types of crime
  • cannot generalise to other murders

  - reductionist approach

  • oversimplifies crime as there are only two categories
  • criminals are rarely just organised or disorganised as they will have characteristics of both
  • suggests classification is too narrow, so loses detail and lowers approach validity

  - Canter et al. study :

  • analysed 100 American serial murders
  • there may be a subset of organised characteristics that define serial murder
  • disorganised murder rarely fits into a distinct typology
  • suggests theory is incomplete