Not long after I began to work as a forensic psychiatrist, a colleague handed me a copy of the Crime Classification Manual (the Manual), then in its first edition. Since then, there has always been a copy within easy reach on my bookshelf. The Manual not only helps the forensic psychiatrist make better use of the data available from law enforcement including forensic, crime scene, and other evidence, it also provides case examples that illustrate the use of such data in understanding the offender and his motives in committing the crime.
Nothing reflects our state of mind as human beings, our motivation, our attitudes, more than what we do and how we do it. The manual is a guide that takes the reader step by step through the behaviors involved in the commission of different kinds of crime. The individual sitting across the table may have been convicted of killing more than one person; would it not help to know the circumstances? Details such as victim selection, the time frame, the modus operandi (i.e., going through the crime as it evolves) can reveal data that border on the dispositive, depending on the question posed in a given forensic consultation. At the very least, it starts one thinking that when it comes to serious crime, one size does not fit all.
Not everyone reading the Manual has first- or even second-hand experience with criminal investigation, much less with crime scene analysis. Not everyone knows the difference between a serial killer and a spree killer (p 16). Even the most experienced of readers might have trouble sorting through the overlapping features of crime scene staging (p 31), personation (p 30), and signature (p 24) before reading the first four chapters of Part I. These four chapters lay the foundation and are written in jargon-free language that facilitates understanding. Beginners will get a thorough grounding on how criminal investigators gather and analyze data and how they reach their conclusions. Forensic psychiatrists familiar with the basics will be brought up to date, especially in areas that have drawn attention only recently. In the case vignettes—psychological and motivational—even psychiatric indicators are integrated with other forensic data in a useful way.
Part II (Chapters 6–17) takes the reader through the classifications. The chapters (as in Parts I and III) contain multiple vignettes and case examples to help demonstrate key points. The case-based approach gives the text an almost clinical feel. Familiarity with the classifications, in my practice, raises questions or considerations that might not have otherwise occurred to me. The classifications provide clues about what to listen for when considering various forensic or clinical facets of both pre- and postadjudication individuals and even when working with psychiatric patients with a history of serious criminal behavior and incarceration.
The classifications are particularly helpful in a practical sense. When interviewing an individual convicted of a sexual assault on an adult for example, would it not be helpful to know whether the crime was a rape committed during the commission of another crime (secondary felony rape), such as burglary; whether rape was the focus of the crime; whether the rape was motivated by a desire to prove the offender's sexual competence and manhood, as in “power reassurance rape” (p 335); or whether the crime was primarily an expression of anger as in “anger rape” (p 342) or hatred based on gender or race? In dealing with the perpetrator of a rape in which the victim's injuries are particularly extensive and severe, noting whether the crime scene and forensic and other indicators suggest that the injuries were inflicted because of rage directed at the victim, on the one hand, or for the purpose of the sadistic gratification of the perpetrator, on the other, might be critical in the formation of a forensic opinion, depending on the context.
Each classification takes us through the defining characteristics of the crime, including the victimology. The offender's characteristics can sometimes function as a starting point in forensic evaluations.
Chapter 14 provides an excellent overview of computer crimes, such as cyberstalking; crimes against children, including solicitation of children on the Internet; and child pornography. Chapter 15 focuses on the increasing globalization of crime and deals with topics that range from human trafficking, terrorism, and hostage-taking to aerial hijackings. An entire chapter is dedicated to the use of poison and biological agents as weapons, an area with which few forensic psychiatrists have much experience.
Finally, Part III (Chapters 18 and 19) deals with points related to the law (interviewing and interrogation techniques and the problem of false confessions) in a careful and balanced manner. The discussion on interviewing and interrogation is aimed at eliciting expressly valid confessions, while warning of factors that can increase an individual's vulnerability to interrogation procedures. The chapter examines how knowledge of the evidence, the crime classification, and data derived from witness interviews and other forensic evidence can be used to aid an interviewer in more clearly understanding the defendant and in eliciting valid responses to questions. Chapter 19, regarding false confessions, provides a useful review of the literature and experience in this area. Although Chapter 18 takes a clearly pro–death-penalty stance in places, the overall balance points to a desire to avoid false confessions in the first place.
Chapter 5 stands apart from the other chapters in the Manual in that it examines a highly controversial topic: the development and use of measures of depravity. Questions raised by this material are far from settled. This chapter could easily be read (or misread) as an attempt to add an aura of scientific quantification to what amounts to the normal visceral reactions elicited by the facts of many heinous crimes, especially those in which the death penalty is considered during sentencing. The section was absent from the first and second editions; I'm not sure what it adds to the third.
Footnotes
Disclosures of financial or other potential conflicts of interest: None.
- © 2015 American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law