Criminal Records and Serial Killers

[jwillx]

I think MINOR offenses should be treated as important clues when investigating a crime supposed to be that of a serial killer.

This is explained, for example, in the article on child-killer Robert Black, Chapter 11 "Recriminations". There, the article author muses, "The question is really why Black was not identified as a suspect at any stage ... However, when we look at research done into the backgrounds of serial killers we see that if they have any past convictions they are hardly ever serious and usually not sexual. ".

Right -- obvious indeed, although the police in this case thought they had a serial killer BUT only looked into suspects with prior serious convictions.

Why obvious? A serious offense would have put the suspect in jail for a long time and later made him or her a prime suspect in the next killing! Any cop around would recall a prior serious conviction. A SERIAL killer has to be able to sneak by suspicion long enough to kill a few more; otherwise, the activities would be terminated by an arrest before they could become SERIAL killing!

[lisaznola]

"I think MINOR offenses should be treated as important clues when investigating a crime supposed to be that of a serial killer."

The problem is which minor crimes? Can we really expect the police to be able to consider EVERY person in the area who has ever had a driving while intoxicated, drunk and disorderly, petty theft or forgery arrest? That would be insane.
Add to that the chance that the petty crimes could have been commited years before the murder, or in a different area of the country so there might not be a record of an arrest in the immediate murder area.
Plus, quite a few serial killers are transient and even thought they might have long petty records, they might not have any record in the area that they passed through and killed in.
Once there is a strong suspect it makes sense to look at the complete history of the person, and I am sure (or hope) that most police do that. It has to be case by case though. Just because a person has had a few bar fights or tried to cash a bad check, that doesn't seal the deal. They could just be an a**ho*e, stupid, or just not nice, but not a killer.