Module 5 - Criminal Profiling

One of the earliest cases involving this method of forensic investigative analysis involved George Metesky, otherwise known as the Mad Bomber, who terrorized New York City through a carefully orchestrated bombing campaign that lasted from 1940 until 1956.

Metesky had worked for United Electric & Power Company in the early 1930s, but he was fired when he sued for compensation after being injured in a work-related accident. Metesky believed that he had developed tuberculosis because of his accident, but his court case was eventually dismissed. His indignation and outrage led to many angry letters to Consolidated Edison, a large conglomerate that had been created by the merger of several small utility companies including United Electric & Power Company in the early 1930s. Metesky’s anger and mental instability led him to place his first bomb at the Consolidated Edison building in downtown New York City in November 1940. Designed as a small pipe bomb, the device never detonated. Police found a crumpled note wrapped around it, bearing the words “CON EDISON CROOKS, THIS IS FOR YOU.” The subsequent police investigation failed to disclose any further evidence, and the matter was considered closed until nearly a year later when a similar device was found nearby.

Investigators from the New York Police Department (NYPD) recognized the construction as similar to the previous device. They were suspicious that this bomb had simply been abandoned in the street. Surprisingly, police received an anonymous letter from Metesky in December 1941 indicating that his patriotic feelings stemming from U.S. entry into World War II meant he would refrain from setting any more bombs until after the war. Metesky’s identity remained hidden from police during this time, and he continued to send threatening letters to Con Edison, the electricity giant in the New York area.

Then, in March 1950, police discovered an unexploded bomb in Grand Central Station. They believed it to have been constructed by the individual who had planted bombs of similar construction almost 10 years earlier. Police and public grew increasingly concerned when two bombs detonated inside the New York Public Library and Grand Central Station. By 1956, the person known as the Mad Bomber had targeted public places such as movie theatres with more than 30 bombs. In December 1956, one bomb hidden within the seat cushion of a movie theatre seat injured six people. A wave of panic set in among the people of New York.

Metesky had improved his bomb-making skills over the years. As a result, the devices he left all over New York were impossible to trace. As the bombs grew in destructive power, so too did the public demand that the NYPD capture the Mad Bomber.

Traditional investigation had been completely unsuccessful, so members of the NYPD crime lab decided to use a radical approach. The suggestion of a psychological profile was not an entirely new idea, but it stimulated much discussion. Acting on a recommendation from internal police sources, a Manhattan criminal psychiatrist named Dr. James Brussel was approached for assistance.

Dr. Brussel, having once served as the Assistant Commissioner of Mental Hygiene for the State of New York, was aware of the ongoing investigation and was interested in the suspect’s personal motivation. His previous counterintelligence work for the FBI and professional background in neuropsychiatry during World War II prepared him for what he was about to take on.

Dr. Brussel reviewed the case file and developed a psychological profile of the suspect, deducing that he suffered from mental illness, most likely paranoia. Dr. Brussel’s profile of the suspect identified him as a past employee of Consolidated Edison, approximately 50 years of age, meticulous in terms of behaviour, with language patterns indicative of foreign ancestry. Letters written by the suspect were subjected to handwriting analysis, and his writing ability and language skills supported the belief that he had likely not attended college. Dr. Brussel reached other conclusions as well, some of which were seen as dubious. Some of these included the assumption that the suspect was single and living with a female relative who was not his mother, based on the phallic nature of his bombs and subsequent handwriting analysis that suggested the suspect drew the letter “W” in a sexually suggestive manner.

Dr. Brussel suggested that, contrary to conventional wisdom, details of the profile should be widely publicized in an attempt to draw out the suspect. As all major New York papers began to publish a summary of the profile, various people began coming forward to confess to the bombings, but holdback evidence such as crime scene photos and writing samples enabled police to eliminate them quickly. Additional leads flooded in, identifying a number of people suspected of fitting the profile. During this time, Metesky continued writing letters, and even called Dr. Brussel directly, warning him to remove himself from the investigation.

Meanwhile, staff at Consolidated Edison continued to review personnel files in hope of finding a past employee who fit the profile. A clerk soon stumbled upon a personnel file for a person named George Metesky of Waterbury, Connecticut, an area north of New York which Dr. Brussel thought may be the home of the suspect. The document revealed that this individual had suffered a work-related accident in the early 1930s and blamed it for his subsequent bout with tuberculosis—a claim that was dismissed in court. After his disability claim was denied, Metesky had written several threatening letters to the company, some of which used language suspiciously similar to that used by “The Mad Bomber”.

The still unidentified bombing suspect responded to a newspaper article and disclosed details of the work-related injury that led to his sense of outrage with Consolidated Edison. This information tied him to the personnel files and identified Metesky as a prime suspect. In January 1957, Metesky was arrested, confessing his involvement almost immediately. The profile was a nearly perfect fit. Interestingly, Dr. Brussel had stated that the suspect would be wearing a double-breasted suit when he was arrested. When police requested that Metesky change into new clothes before being transported to police headquarters, he donned a double-breasted suit, buttoned up just as Dr. Brussel had predicted!

Dr. Brussel’s pioneering work on the Mad Bomber investigation resulted in fame and further involvement in other criminal investigations. It served as a basis for further development of psychological profiling as a key component in the investigation of serial criminals.

George Metesky was judged not to be criminally responsible due to his state of acute paranoia, and he was committed to a mental hospital. He was released in 1973 and lived his final years at his family’s residence in Connecticut, dying at the age of 90 in 1994.