Real-Life Communication
A rash of fires has been plaguing a neighborhood of the city where
you work as a psychologist and criminal profiler. After determining that all
three were deliberately set, investigators discover traces of the same accelerant
(the substance used to fuel the fire) at each of the crime scenes.
It
looks as though they have a serial arsonist on their hands -- and they want
your help in catching him before someone gets hurt. At least, you must assume
it's a male, since the vast majority of arsonists are male.
After examining
the evidence of a crime, profilers must determine who most likely committed
it. Then they have to convey that information in a meaningful way.
"Communications
skills are vital," says Brent Turvey. He is the author of a textbook on criminal
profiling. "You have to be able to form compelling arguments, based on logic
and reason, and then you must successfully communicate them. If you don't,
eventually, you're going to be found out."
Say you're serving as an
expert witness at court. "The jury is not going to listen to you if you're
testifying and not communicating well," Turvey says.
Or say a law enforcement
agency publicly releases a profile in hopes that someone will recognize the
perpetrator. No matter how accurate, a poorly presented profile will have
far less of an impact than one that is expertly communicated.
You begin
by studying the three crime scenes. The arsonist set his first known fire
in a dumpster outside of a chic nightclub shortly after it closed for the
night. He set the second one during the early morning hours in a recently
closed hospital sometimes used by squatters. Luckily, nobody was there at
the time.
Lastly and most dramatically, he set fire to a historic home
while the couple who lived there slept. They managed to escape, but lost everything
in the blaze.
You recognize a familiar pattern. Serial arsonists will
often start small, setting fire to a tree, for instance, or to junk in a dumpster.
As the initial thrill wears off, they seek out more challenging targets, such
as unoccupied buildings.
As that, too, grows less exciting, they move
on to occupied buildings -- knowing that someone could be injured, or worse,
in the process.
A closer inspection of the arsonist's MO shows that
he is an opportunist. The dumpster behind the nightclub was full of flammable
materials, like paper and wood. So was the abandoned hospital, where he began
the fire on a mattress left by squatters.
This suggests to you that
the arsonist's initial motive was excitement. Setting fires gave him a charge.
He may well have hung around the crime scene watching the blazes he started
and the ensuing commotion that he created.
A more disturbing trend
emerges in his selection of the abandoned hospital as a second target. Many
dangerous offenders prey on the vulnerable -- in this case, the homeless --
in order to gain a sense of power.
Other motives seem to have been
behind the fire at the home, which bears all the hallmarks of a well-planned
crime. It appears that the arsonist initially threw a rock through the ground-level
kitchen window, shattering the glass and leaving a gaping hole, through which
he tossed accelerant-doused rags and a match to light them.
While the
other two crimes occurred within walking distance of each other, the third
fire took place several miles away.
In each of the three cases, the
arsonist used the same expensive lighter fluid as an accelerant. This suggests
to you that he is not content to simply light a match and start a fire. He
wants to feel in control of the blaze and how it spreads.
Although
for the third case, you'd like to do a more thorough victimology -- that is,
a study of the victims -- you sketch out what you've learned so far about
the perpetrator in a few short paragraphs.
"One of the most important
skills you can have as a profiler is the ability to do research and write
a report," says Turvey. Though many profilers do not write out reports, preferring
to give a verbal assessment based on notes, he believes that "writing skills
are absolutely necessary if you want to do a good job."