Abstract

Sexual homicides are difficult to solve as they often appear to be random and motiveless. To help police investigations in apprehending criminals, the present study aimed to classify different types of sexual homicide offenders based on crime-scene behavior. Using the multidimensional methodology of Smallest Space Analysis, the present study showed that sexual homicide crime-scene actions could be differentiated in terms of expressive and instrumental aggression: the expressive theme consisted of violent behaviors centering on hurting the victim, whereas the instrumental theme consisted of behaviors focusing on the benefits the victim provided for the offender. For a more comprehensive examination of the results, crime-scene actions were placed into five behavioral categories: sexual, wounding, planning/control, disposal, and weapon behaviors. Further exploration using the Multidimensional Scalogram Analysis showed that three of these categories, sexual, planning/control, and disposal, were most effective for differentiating sexual homicides.