“In terms of practical application to our case, we’d likely see this as a hallmark of his in his past crimes. Interpersonal crimes of violence. And-it’s probable that he’s had contact with law enforcement before because of this anger.”
A long moment passed. The two inspectors appeared to be absorbing the information.
“Well,” Friedberg finally said, “you’ve totally ruined my day, Karen. Sounds like this is a seriously bad dude we’re after.”
“I’d have hoped you would’ve already known that from what he did to the wife.”
Burden cleared his throat. “So why do you say it doesn’t fit the typical elderly female sexual killer?”
Vail sighed deeply. She looked over at the hooded offender on the screen. “Okay, here’s the deal. There are a number of similarities here. I’ll be totally honest with you so you can make your own assessment. When we’re talking about an offender who sexually murders elderly women, the mean age of the victim is usually around 77. So we’re in the ballpark here. And the vics they choose are overwhelmingly Caucasian-about 86 percent. Our vics are Caucasian. And more than 70 percent of the typical vics have lived in their place of residence for ten years or more. The Andersons have been there nineteen. And like the Andersons, over 70 percent of the typical elderly vics did not have better home security than simple locks on their doors.”
“You saw the crime scene,” Friedberg said. “No alarms and no forced entry.”
“Right. And we see that in about 60 percent of the cases, where the offenders enter through unlocked doors or windows-”
“So that fits.”
Vail bobbed her head. “Yes-but maybe not. For the moment, let’s stick with the similarities. The injuries inflicted on the victims appear to be consistent with what we would expect to see. The typical injury severity in an elderly sexual homicide is much greater than what’d be necessary to cause death.”
“Overkill,” Burden said.
Vail nodded. “We’re getting away from the term ‘overkill’ and starting to call it an ‘excessive injury pattern’ because it’s more accurate. But yes. The vics often suffer multiple severe injuries. Strangulation is the most common, somewhere around 65 percent of the time. Blunt force trauma is second, in the high thirties. But broadly speaking, that’s really where the similarities end.”
“These guys who do this to old women…” Friedberg said. “I remember Safarik talking about a specific motive, but I can’t remember what he said it was.”
“Safarik found that, on the surface, it’s all about power, or anger, or both. In a deeper sense, though, it’s really about punishing, dominating, and controlling his victim. This offender’s assaults are rarely about sexual gratification. Physical force is the predominant form of violence they use-often involving their hands, fists, or knives.” Vail leaned back in her chair. “But the most interesting thing-and I think this makes a hell of a lot of sense-is that these offenders, who tend to be younger men-see the elderly female as representing an authority figure. Or they may even be the actual woman who was the source of the anger he’s feeling. And that’s obviously why he wants to exert power over her. With these sexual homicides, sexuality is the method he uses to get his revenge or to transmit his hostility.”
Friedberg placed both elbows on the desk. “You said the UNSUB we’re looking for doesn’t look like the typical offender who rapes and murders elderly women. But everything you’ve said so far sure looks like the kind of guy we’re looking for.”
“Like I said, there are similarities. But they’re mostly similarities relative to victimology. If we look at offender characteristics and the behaviors left at the scene, it’s a different story. The offenders who sexually abuse and then murder elderly women are criminally unsophisticated. It’s a spontaneous act, with little or no planning. They leave behind a fair amount of evidence and the scene is sloppy and random.
“He doesn’t make efforts to hide or protect his identity. And he uses a blitz attack to gain control and disable his target. While our UNSUB’s attack was brutally violent, it wasn’t blitz-like. Like I said before, it was controlled anger. And it doesn’t look like he had any trouble controlling Maureen-or William. We’d also see property taken, money or valuables. Far as we know, nothing was missing. There’s more about these offenders I can tell you, but unless we’re convinced this is the type of guy we’re looking for, it’s senseless-”
“Like what?” Burden asked. “Share it all so we can make an informed decision.”
Vail frowned. “Fine. These offenders tend to be alcohol or drug users. They have lower intelligence and are what we used to classify as disorganized. They’re often unemployed and have a poor work history. Not surprisingly, that goes with a diverse arrest record, for a variety of unrelated crimes. And they also tend to be antisocial and/or socially incompetent-which doesn’t appear to be the case with our UNSUB because, unless the Andersons were easy marks, it looks like our offender was able to talk his way into the townhouse with no signs of difficulty.”
“You’re holding back on us,” Burden said. “You said there was an exception to all this.”
Indeed I did. Vail sighed. “I didn’t want to confuse things because-”
“Confuse things, or confuse us?”
Keep calm. Count to ten. Hell with that-who’s got time to count to ten? “Safarik did have a case like Maureen Anderson. Robert Mark Edwards tortured an elderly woman to death. Rammed things up her vagina and ruptured her uterus and internal organs, then pulled her fingernails off with pliers and did the same to one of her nipples. Edwards was a sexual sadist who was also a smart guy. But he’s an outlier.”
Burden spread his hands apart. “So our UNSUB could be an outlier, too.”
“Sometimes you have to go with your gut. You’ve been a cop a long time, you know that. And I know Mark Safarik and I’ve discussed all his cases with him. And if Mark were here, he’d tell you that guys like Edwards are exceptionally rare, that our UNSUB is a different animal than the animals in his research.”
“Well, he’s not here to tell me that. I’ve gotta take your word for it. Regardless, you shouldn’t have held that back.”
“Burden, listen to me. You know how many serial offenders there’ve been? I can’t brief you on every case that could be similar to this one. Part of my value to you and Robert is to cut through all the fat and narrow things down. Just like if you had a list of fifty suspects, my profile would pare it down to a handful who are most likely to be our UNSUB. That outlier case is so rare, it wasn’t worth mentioning. And there are other things, too, which support that.”
There was a silent moment as Burden and Vail stared at each other.
Friedberg cleared his throat. “Back at their place, you wanted a list of all residents within a six-block radius.”
“Because these offenders typically live in the neighborhood and walk to their victim’s house. They’ve lived in the area for years, and they may’ve even seen the victim a number of times in the past. A guy I know does geographic profiling-which is basically the study of where offenders feel comfortable operating from a geographic point of view. The research suggests some offenders create ‘mental maps’ of an area when they identify one or more victims who interest them.”
“Mental maps?”
“An offender catalogs victim information in a mental ‘card file’ that allows him to find that victim again in the future. Mental mapping.”
Friedberg stuck the cigarette back in his mouth. “So much for being safe in your own neighborhood.”
“I still think there’s too many questions,” Burden said. “We can’t reach any conclusions yet.”