Offenders' perceptual shorthand: what messages are law enforcement officers sending to offenders?

Predatory animals always have displayed certain adaptive behaviors. For example, the leopard possesses an amazing ability to look into a large grazing herd of gazelle and instantaneously single out from this vast gathering the one most vulnerable to attack. The leopard may observe a slight limp, indiscernible to the human eye, or some other equally susceptible characteristic unrecognizable to anyone but a predator. Because its very existence depends on the ability to perceive slight weaknesses in otherwise-unremarkable behavior, a predator's actions must remain definitive, quick, and effective.

Much like the predators found tracking the untamed jungles for easy victims, human predators stalk urban jungles for equally vulnerable targets. Similar to the beasts of the jungle, human predators look into crowds and search, consciously or unconsciously, for some weakness. Unlike the leopard who kills only for physical nourishment, however, human predators pick their prey for a variety of reasons. Law enforcement officers know all too well the unpredictability of the human predator, but do they realize that they, the public's protectors, can become victims through their own actions?

ANALYZING THE RESEARCH

Over the past 10 years, the FBI has researched various aspects of law enforcement safety. From this research and from studies on law enforcement training, several important issues have emerged. One issue relates to the perceptions that offenders have of police officers. The research illustrates that the way offenders perceive officers impacts how they interact with them.(1)

To begin with, studies in social psychology have indicated that the way humans carry themselves - including how they walk, speak, gesture, move, and look - communicates various messages.(2) These messages range from signaling their apparent happiness to their preoccupation, at any given time, with what they consider "weighty matters." This preoccupation may make them appear awkward in their footing or hesitant in their movements. Whatever is going on within the individual is played out in external behavior. These internal struggles may prove easily recognizable or well hidden, but they nonetheless affect behavior in some way.

Additionally, criminal justice literature has attempted to examine situations where officers can detect deception based on the verbal and nonverbal cues suspects and offenders exhibit.(3) Further, law enforcement training academies teach officers to observe the body gestures and movements of individuals they question. For example, watching for potential "runners" while questioning suspects alerts officers to those suspects possibly preparing to escape. Through such indicators as shifting their feet, moving their eyes, and tilting their bodies, suspects may suggest their intentions to flee. This "perceptual shorthand" gives officers a quick and effective means of preparing themselves for potential threats to their safety.

According to the FBI's research and studies by other professionals, offenders also engage in perceptual shorthand during the commission of their crimes.(4) This discovery warrants closer examination for two main reasons. First, officers should become more aware of the nonverbal signals and messages they send to suspects with whom they interact Second, a greater degree of interest within the law enforcement research community may prompt additional study into this important area of officer safety. Three major cases from the FBI's research illustrate the need for such scrutiny.

The Articulate Robber Case

The first murderer of a police officer to bring this matter of the offender's perceptual shorthand to the FBI's attention was an articulate young man, only 18 years old at the time of the killing. He had robbed a convenience store at gunpoint and fled on foot. During the suspect's escape, a uniformed officer noticed that he fit the description of the suspect given in a radio broadcast. The officer called to the young man to stop. The offender stated that the officer "was not authoritarian, was very polite, and did not take control of me or make any attempt to control my actions." The offender remarked that as the officer approached him - a suspected armed robber - the officer's gun remained in his holster. The offender stated that after ignoring commands from the officer to stop and put his hands up, he turned and shot him.

The offender stated that he believed the officer "did not perceive me as a threat, and so [he] made no attempt to protect himself." After evaluating the officer's behavior and tone of voice during this encounter, the offender decided that he had the edge, which resulted in the officer's death. By his own admission, the offender perceived a vulnerability in the officer's actions and took advantage of it.

The Voice of God Case

In another case, an offender stated that he had "planned to kill an officer" on the day he actually murdered one. This offender was a small-time drug dealer and a major drug abuser. He stated that he had received a message from God that he should kill a police officer because the police were mining his drag business. To accomplish this, he proceeded to a busy intersection near his home to find an officer to kill. Because of his degree of drag abuse, his plan lacked clear and precise thinking. He neither considered how he would confront an officer at this particular location, nor did he obtain a weapon to use.

However, arriving at his predetermined location, he observed a uniformed sergeant at a service station having a tire repaired on his marked patrol vehicle. By his admission, the offender approached the sergeant intending to kill him. However, he stated that "by looking at him, I could tell that he would be too difficult to overcome." When questioned about how the sergeant looked or what aspects of his appearance or demeanor caused the offender to believe that he could not "overcome" the sergeant, he was unable to say anything except "he looked too difficult to take." When questioned further about his perception of the sergeant's appearance, the offender stated that he was not particularly large in size or menacing in appearance but "just looked like he could handle himself."

The offender remained at this location for approximately 2 hours until a traffic accident occurred, and a one-officer patrol vehicle responded to the scene. The offender observed the officer for only a short time before he "knew this was my victim." Having made that decision, the offender casually walked over to the officer and struck him with his fist. As the officer fell to the ground, the offender removed the officer's service weapon and shot him six times.

When asked what criteria he had used to evaluate the officer, the offender again had difficulty putting his thought process into words. He could recall only that the officer appeared "overweight and looked easy." What the offender did not know was that the victim officer, with 10 years of law enforcement experience, had refused to wear his department-issued soft body armor and recently had received a substandard performance evaluation. In addition, in another incident the year before, a subject had taken the officer's service weapon, but the officer's partner had shot and killed the subject. Apparently, the victim officer had sent assorted nonverbal messages to a variety of individuals - officials, fellow officers, and offenders - before his death.

The "Dope Boys" Case

The last incident involves an individual who assaulted a law enforcement officer in order to "send a message to the cops in my city." He decided to deliver his message, "quit messing with the 'dope boys'," by killing an officer. During a community celebration, the armed offender approached one of several officers assigned to the parade route for traffic and crowd control, intending to shoot him. However, he stated that after looking at the first officer he approached, "I knew he'd be a difficult target," so the offender moved through the crowd. After observing the next officer he came upon, the offender removed his gun from his pants pocket and shot the officer in the head. This officer stated that he saw the offender's gun "at the last second...just prior to the shot." His quick hand movement shifted the weapon from between his eyes, deflected the path of the bullet, and saved his life.

The first officer never realized that the offender had targeted him. Nor did he know that whatever he was doing - whether the way he looked, the way he walked, or the way he spoke to those around him - had sent a message that he was in control. Further, the offender stated that he had no prior contact with either of these officers before the incident. As in the other cases, this offender had difficulty articulating exactly what cues he perceived from these two officers that affected his decision.

IMPLEMENTING THE FINDINGS

In many of the cases examined, the offenders could not articulate the exact cues they perceived regarding the targeted officer's appearance, gait, or behavior. However, killers and assaulters alike stated that if their victims generally gave the impression that they appeared authoritative (not authoritarian), seemed resolute, or acted professionally, then the offenders were reluctant to initiate an assault.(5) This statement does not mean that officers should not have a personable approach with the public or that they should not employ community policing practices. It does mean, however, that all officers must consider the messages that their actions and behaviors send. Also, they must maintain a high level of vigilance and preparedness in carrying out their assigned duties. Two rules remain true: officers should treat everyone the way they would like to be treated, and they should protect themselves so they can continue to protect their communities.

Moreover, these findings demonstrate the need for greater research in the area of perceptual shorthand used by offenders when they encounter law enforcement officers. Existing research indicates that nonverbal behaviors and actions can communicate the internal disposition of an individual. For example, a depressed individual often exhibits slow body movements, a lack of energy, and the inability to concentrate or focus. These external behaviors send certain messages, and observers receive those messages for good or ill. An officer's casual, "routine" approach to a vehicle during a traffic stop may communicate to the offender a possible mental or emotional distractibility. Further, the absence of certain appropriate behaviors on the officer's part also might communicate dangerous messages to the offender. For example, situations in which officers neglect to follow suspects' body movements during questioning, especially hand movements or shifts in body positions, may communicate their lack of readiness to act. When received by human predators, such messages could prove deadly to officers who remain unaware of the impact of their behaviors and actions. Therefore, the law enforcement community should conduct additional research to find the key to unlock the cues that offenders observe in officers they choose to attack.

CONCLUSION

Just as predatory animals search out the weakest prey, human predators employ the same tactic. Law enforcement officers must remember that while they observe nonverbal messages from the individuals they question, these individuals also gather information from them. Subtle nuances that others would not view as weaknesses become opportunities for human predators to exploit. Law enforcement officers must protect themselves against such individuals who search for easy prey and strike with little or no warning.

The law enforcement community must ban together to make officers aware of the importance of understanding how their behaviors and actions impact their survival even when performing the most basic, and sometimes mundane, official duties. Only then will officers no longer fall victim to predatory offenders using perceptual shorthand to select the most vulnerable targets.

Endnotes

1 A.J. Pinizzotto and E.F. Davis, "Cop Killers and Their Victims," FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, December 1992, 9; "Killed in the Line of Duty: Procedural and Training Issues," FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, March 1995, 1; "Above and Beyond the Call of Duty: Preventing Off-duty Officer Deaths," FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, April 1996, 1: "Interviewing Methods: A Specialized Approach Is Needed When Investigating Police Deaths," Law and Order 44 (1996): 68; and U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Killed in the Line of Duty: A Study of Selected Felonious Killings of Law Enforcement Officers (Washington, DC, 1992) and In the Line of Fire: Violence Against Law Enforcement (Washington, DC, 1997).

2 R.A. Hinde, ed., Nonverbal Communication (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1972); E.E. Jones, Interpersonal Perception (New York: Freeman, 1990); S.T. Fiske and S.E. Taylor, Social Cognition (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1991); and W.B. Pearce, Nonverbal Communication (New York: Harper Collins, 1994).

3 C.G. Brougham, "Nonverbal Communication: Can What They Don't Say Give Them Away?" FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, July 1992, 15; J.P. Buckley and P.A. Mullenix, "Use of Behavioral Symptoms in the Search for the Truth: A Tool for the Prosecutor," Polygraph 15 (1986): 40; D.K. Mills, "Deception," American Probation and Parole Association Perspectives 15 (1991): 6; and F.W. Winkel, L. Koppelaar, and L. Greuel, "Police Officers' Beliefs About Cues Associated with Deception in Rape Cases," in Psychology and the Law: International Perspectives, ed. F. Losel, D. Bender, et al. (Germany: Walter de Gruyter & Company, 1992).

4 B.A. Jacobs, "Undercover Deception Clues: A Case of Restrictive Deterrence," Criminology 31 (1993): 281 and "Crack Dealers and Restrictive Deterrence: Identifying Narcs." Criminology 34 (1996): 409.

5 Supra note 1.

Dr. Anthony J. Pinizzotto is an instructor in the Behavioral Science Unit at the FBI Academy.

Mr. Edward F. Davis is an instructor in the Behavioral Science Unit at the FBI Academy.