ABSTRACT
Much attention in the last decade that has been focused on the offender consistency hypothesis in serial murder seems to be in conflict. 56, 163 For instance, there appear to be rather broad opinions as to whether serial murderers are organized at the beginning of their criminal careers, then become disorganized over time. One hypothesis is that crime scene actions in one offense will consistently occur in subsequent offenses. This would imply that serial murderers’ crime scene actions are consistent from one offense to the next. However, some researchers argue that serial murderers start their criminal careers as disorganized, and thus become organized over time due to situational learning. 18, 50, 81 These opinions on the consistency of serial murderers are rather vexing and have been predominately based on deductive work experience and inferences made about an offender’s fantasy life or possible Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) scores. As a result, there has been no empirical undertaking to explore how consistent serial murderers are from one crime to the next.
