Confessions of sex offenders: extracting offender and victim profiles for investigative interviewing

Abstract

Purpose

Although offender profiling has been cited as an effective tool to interview suspects, empirical profiling methods have completely excluded interviewing suggestions when testing the validity of this technique. The purpose of this paper is to explore the utility of empirically derived profiles of offender- and victim-related sexual assault case characteristics (n=624) in the preparation of the interrogation strategies in sexual assault investigations.

Design/methodology/approach

Latent class analysis was used to extract profiles of offender- and victim-related sexual assault case characteristics in a sample of 624 incarcerated sex offenders. Moreover, relationships between offender and victim profiles were conducted using χ² analyses.

Findings

Findings show that specific offender-victim profiles are related to greater likelihood of confession during the interrogation. Possible interrogation strategies for each profile are suggested and implications for the practice of interviewing suspects are discussed.

Originality/value

The study is the first to examine both victim and offender profiles in order to assess the significant victim-offender profile combinations and their associated probabilities of resulting in confession.

Citation

Beauregard, E., Busina, I. and Healey, J. (2017), "Confessions of sex offenders: extracting offender and victim profiles for investigative interviewing", Journal of Criminal Psychology, Vol. 7 No. 1, pp. 13-28. https://doi.org/10.1108/JCP-10-2016-0031