Abstract
There are investigative advantages to being able to determine early in a police investigation whether a rape has been committed by a serial or one-off rapist. Previous research has found some differences in the crime-scene behaviours of serial and one-off rapists, however, this research suffers from the limitation of utilising a sample of rapes within which there was a mixture of victim-offender relationships. To address this limitation, this study sampled 38 serial (two or more convictions) and 50 one-off (one conviction) stranger rapists and compared their crime scene behaviour across four domains (control, sex, escape and style behaviours). Serial and one-off rapists differed in some control and sexual behaviours; in particular, in the type of victim targeted, the offence locations, methods of control and the sexual acts forced upon the victim. However, the results did not indicate a striking difference in the offending behaviour of the two groups. The implications of these findings for criminal investigations are discussed.Citation
Slater, C., Woodhams, J., & Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. (2014). Can serial rapists be distinguished from one-off rapists?. Behavioral sciences & the law, 32 (2), pp 220-239.Publisher
WileyJournal
Behavioral Sciences & the LawDOI
10.1002/bsl.2096Additional Links
http://doi.wiley.com/10.1002/bsl.2096Type
Journal articleLanguage
enISSN
0735-3936Sponsors
University of Birminghamae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1002/bsl.2096
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