Real life “crackers” who attempt to penetrate the minds of serial killers were yesterday accused of being “worthless” purveyors of bad science.
Criminal profilers, such as the Fitz character portrayed by Robbie Coltrane in the Cracker TV series, were said to be “dragging down” psychology and almost on a par with fortune tellers.
The assault came from consultant psychologist Craig Jackson, co-author of a damning critique of the profession soon to be published in a legal journal.
He argues that criminal profiling may be surrounded by a media-driven mystique but is unscientific and potentially harmful.
“Behavioural profiling has never led to the direct apprehension of a serial killer or murderer, so it seems to have no real-world value,” said Dr Jackson.
“There have been no clinical trials to show that behavioural profiling works and there have been major miscarriages of justice.
“It’s given too much credibility as a scientific discipline and I think this is a serious issue.”
Profiling involves building up a picture of an as-yet unidentified suspect from the offender’s methods, choice of victim, and clues left at the crime scene.
Britain’s best known criminal profiler is Paul Britton, who has been involved in high profile cases such as the Fred and Rose West killings, and the murders of James Bulger, schoolgirl Naomi Smith and Rachel Nickell.
In 2002 Mr Britton was cleared of professional misconduct by the British Psychological Society after the collapse of the case against Nickell suspect Colin Stagg.
Serial rapist Robert Napper eventually admitted murdering Ms Nickell on Wimbledon Common, south-west London, in 1992.
Dr Jackson will voice his criticisms this week at the British Festival of Science, which opened today at Aston University in Birmingham.
The technique of behavioural profiling was first adopted by the FBI in 1972 and had been “going non-stop ever since”, he said.
But although it had provided colourful material for newspapers, movies and TV programmes, there was no evidence that profiling did any good, he said.
“As psychologists we have concerns that the ‘science’ of behavioural science is dragging us down,” said Dr Jackson.
He said that typically criminal profilers portrayed themselves more as witch doctors than scientists; people with unusual special gifts that were both a blessing and a burden.
“They bring themselves forward as if they are shamans cursed with the nightmares of dead people,” said Dr Jackson. “It almost takes us back to primitivism. It isn’t a good advert for science.”
The opposite view is expressed in the novel and film The Silence Of The Lambs, in which a rookie FBI agent relies on one serial killer – the ruthless psychopath Hannibal Lecter – to help her catch another. Dr Jackson and his co-authors, a criminologist and an organisational psychiatrist, focus their attention on criminal profiling pioneer and ex-FBI agent John E. Douglas – who inspired the Jack Crawford character in Thomas Harris’s Hannibal Lecter novels. Their paper will appear in the journal Amicas next month.
Douglas was involved in the hunt for American serial killer Dennis Rader, known by the nickname he gave himself, BTK (bind, torture, kill).
The “BTK strangler” murdered 10 victims in Wichita, Kansas, between 1974 and 1991 before being brought to justice.
The role Douglas played in the investigation was outlined in his best-selling book Inside The Mind Of BTK: The True Story Behind The 30 Year Hunt For The Notorious Wichita Serial Killer.