Hickey Group

8/8/2019 Hickey Group

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Serial Murderers and Their Victims

Eric W. Hickey, Ph.D.Jen Blum Ericka Hancock

Janele Edwards Heather KolodziejSuzanne Garrison Lauren Mondshein


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Eric W. Hickey, Ph.D.j Dr. Hickey earned his

Ph.D. in socialPsychology fromBrigham YoungUniversity in 1985

j He taughtcriminology courses atWest Virginia Collegeand Ball StateUniversity


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Eric W. Hickey, Ph.D.

j

In 1990, he became a member of theCriminology department at California StateUniversity, Fresno


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Eric W. Hickey, Ph.D.

j He has considerable field experienceworking with the criminally insane,

psychopaths, sex offenders, and as an FBITask Force consultantj He is internationally recognized for his

research contribution on multiple homicideoffenders


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Law Enforcement Contributions

j Conducts and develops training for agenciesfocused on profiling and investigating sex

crimes, homicides, stalking, arsons, andworkplace violence/terrorismj Trained VIP protection specialists at the

International Security School in Israel on profiling stalkers and counter-terrorism


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j Testifies in criminal and civil casesj Appeared as an expert guest on many

television shows

Law Enforcement Contributions


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Construction of the Model


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Model Sample

j Based on cases of serial murders from 1800to 1995: 337 men and 62 women

j Only included cases where offender wascharged with the murder of 3 or more people

j Used interviews, newspapers, journals, bibliographies, biographies, and computer searches to obtain case data


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Model Analysis

Variables examined:j Time frame of murders

j Geographyj Number of victims

j Age of victimsj Victim gender

j High risk victims


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Aims of the Model

To find patterns in:

j Methods of killingj Motivesj Conduct

j Victim/Offender relationships


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Hickeys Model

By examining different groups or individuals experiencing the same

process we learn to identifystructural uniformities.

(Hickey, 2003)


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Serial Murder Typologies

j Team Killers Masterminds

Occupations Mobility Ritualism/Cults Victim Selection Methods Offender History

j The Female Killer Emergence

Victim Selection Methods/Motives Psychopathology Mobility


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Reliability and Validity


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Reliability/Validity

j Has not yet been demonstratedj Problems with replication

j Unpublished study (2004) gives preliminarysupport


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Problems with this Type of

Research

j Using archival dataj Potential confounds of those who were

never caught or identifiedj Does not generalize to other culturesj Poor inter-rater reliability


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Usefulness

j Good foundation for further research, i.e.

Mott (1995)j Trauma Control model used by bothPollock (1995) and unpublished study(2004)


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Positive and Negative

Aspects


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Negatives Positivesj Hickey is an academic

in the way he presentshis research and model

j Points out negativeimpact of media and ischanging how serialkillers are portrayed

j Classification systemis a foundation for other researchers

j Hickeys book iscolloquial in nature,not scientific

j Book can be seen aswell integrated

propaganda for themasses

j Non-replicable, cannotdelineate into usefulapproach or technique


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Negatives Positives

j Definition of serialkiller is very broad

j Examines objectivelywhat is known about amurder

j Does not go in with aset bias

j No solid definition of a serial killer

j Relies on thetruthfulness of theoffender

j Subjective informationgathering and

processing


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Negatives Positivesj Gives detailed

overview of a varietyof theories and a

totality of other researchers work

j Self-gratifying,establishing himself asthe hallmark figure of

Criminology


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What else is Needed


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Reliability Testing

j Study Replication: Can the same results beobtained from a different professional?


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No Reliability Demonstrated

j Need to define more concrete, objectiveoperational definitions for variables in thestudy

j Must be able to prove reliability!!!


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Reliability Demonstrated

Further research is needed to:

j Investigate in more detail the patternsemerging from the data

j Determine if this model can be useful in a

real world setting

Documents

Hickey Group