Amy Mihaljevic Jonbenet crimes have absolutely nothing in common

ABSTRACT This article examines a process of behavioral analysis, referred to as linkage analysis, used in identifying sexual offenses that have been committed by the same offender. This type of analysis examines behavior that is contained in three distinct components of a crime, i.e., the modus operandi (MO) or the “how to” of a crime; the ritual or fantasy-based behaviors for a particular type or series of sexual crimes; the signature or unique combination of behaviors, which suggests that a series of crimes has been perpetrated by the same offender. Linkage analysis involves five assessment procedures: (1) gathering detailed, varied, and multisource documentation; (2) reviewing the documentation and identifying significant features of each crime individually across the series; (3) classifying the significant features of the crime as either MO and/or ritualistic constructs; (4) comparing the combination of MO and ritualistic features across the crimes to determine if a signature exists; (5) compiling a written analysis that details the conclusions derived from the available information. Results of this type of analysis can be used for investigative purposes and, in some instances, can help to inform the decision-making of the courts.

Signature aspects are the offender’s motivational themes, or psychological needs, suggested by convergences of signature behaviors. They are thought to be relatively stable over time within offenders, although they are susceptible to the influences of fantasy development.
In order to understand the motivations of violent, predatory offenders, Nicholas Groth, an American clinical psychologist who worked with both victims and offender populations, published a study of over 500 rapists in 1979. In that study, he found that rape, like other crimes that satisfy emotional needs, is complex and multidetermined; that is to say, the act of rape itself serves a number of psychological needs and purposes for the offender. From Groth’s studies and the work of others, a rapist motivational typology has been developed that places offender behavior into one of five typologies (which are examples of signature aspects, in criminal profiling terminology):
• Power reassurance: offender behaviors that suggest an underlying lack of confidence and inadequacy, or belief that the offense is consensual, expressed through minimal force and low confidence (i.e. fondling and foreplay behavior, apologies, compliments, minimal victim injury, weapon present for control only, etc.).
• Power assertive: offender behaviors that suggest an underlying lack of confidence and inadequacy, expressed through a need for control, mastery and humiliation of the victim, while demonstrating authority (i.e. use of extreme profanity, macho attitude, verbally commanding/threatening, limited fondling and foreplay behavior, ripping of victim clothing, weapon used to inflict corrective injury).
• Anger retaliatory: offender behaviors that suggest a great deal of rage, either towards a specific person, group, institution or a symbol of either (i.e. use of brutal force, high amount of potentially lethal victim damage, hostile language, weapons of opportunity, lack of planning, etc.).
• Sadistic: offender behaviors that suggest that the offender gets sexual gratification from victim pain and suffering (i.e. physical, mental, or sexual torture of a living victim, time spent enjoying the attack, etc.).
• Opportunistic: offender behaviors that suggest an offender who is out to satisfy immediate sexual impulses (i.e. rape committed during another offense, victim of opportunity, lack of planning, much physical evidence left behind at the scene, etc.).
Although it does not provide a dynamic scale that measures a rapist over time, it is an excellent way of assessing them at a particular moment. The typologies are not to be confused with profiles, nor by any means should they be considered an exclusive list of signature aspects. They provide a psychological snapshot of a rapist during a single instance from which some inferences can be made. There is also no bright yellow line between the typologies, meaning that a single offender can evidence aspects from more than one. The typologies actually classify the needs satisfied by offender behavioral patterns at one point in time, rather than define the offenders themselves.
As with motivational typologies, signature aspects are not always exclusive. A single offender may evidence multiple signature aspects during the same offense and separate signature aspects during different types of offenses. Additionally, a single behavior cannot be taken out of context to suggest an overall pattern. Patterns only become evident upon the convergence of multiple behaviors in a context that is known and understood by the profiler.
One example would include an offender who, within the same attack over a period of a few hours, tortures a prostitute with a pair of pliers and yells at them to scream so that he can hear it, and then engages in caressing and fondling behavior while apologizing. The context is the rape and possible abduction of a stranger. The evidence of torture would suggest a sadistic signature aspect, while the caressing, fondling and apologizing would suggest a reassurance-oriented signature aspect.
Another example would include an offender who robs a convenience store on one day, shooting all of the patrons inside at least six times each in full view of the security camera, but who robs a bank a few days later, wearing a disguise, using a note, without firing a single shot. The amount of overkill and lack of concern for later identification in the convenience store example begins to suggest an anger aspect. This is a marked contrast from the lack of psychologically revealing behaviors evidenced in the profit-motivated bank robbery.

Recognizing Offender Signature

As mentioned, the term signature and the underlying psychological concepts have been developed specifically to separate them from an offender’s MO. Because MO behaviors can change over time, the tendency of law enforcement to rely solely upon an offender’s MO for investigative strategy and case linkage can lead to what has been termed ‘linkage blindness.’ Linkage blindness has been defined as the failure to recognize a pattern that links one crime with another crime in a series of cases.
Specifically, there are three very important factors that can act individually or in concert to cause linkage blindness:
• The tendency for law enforcement to rely solely on MO behaviors, such as victim type, weapon selection and location type, as a basis for case linkage.
• The possibility that one predatory offender is operating in or near the same general area as another, confusing law enforcement efforts.
• Interpersonal or interagency conflicts, which can lead to communication breakdowns and a lack of information sharing.
The ability to read the behavioral evidence in a crime scene and recognize offender signature has been shown to be extremely beneficial to the investigative process, and there are many examples of the successful investigative use of offender signature in the published literature.

One day in late October 1989, Amy received a phone call after school. He said he needed her help to pick out a present for her mother and had to keep it a secret. The man said he chose Amy because she could keep a better secret than her brother.

He convinced her to walk to the Bay Square Shopping Center Oct. 27. Then he talked her into calling McNulty to make sure she didn't worry.

But Amy couldn't keep a secret - she told two friends.  

The abductor had contacted Mihaljevic by telephone and arranged to meet her on the pretext of buying a gift for her mother because she had recently been promoted, as he told her. In November 2006 it was revealed that several other young girls had received phone calls similar to that to which Amy responded, during the weeks prior to Amy's abduction in 1989. These comprised requests from an unknown man, claiming to work with their mother, asking the girl to help him shop for a present to celebrate her mother's job promotion. The girls who received these calls lived in North Olmsted, a suburb near Bay Village; some had unlisted phone numbers

Persuasion is an umbrella term of influence. Persuasion can attempt to influence a person's beliefs, attitudes, intentions, motivations, or behaviors.[1] In business, persuasion is a process aimed at changing a person's (or a group's) attitude or behavior toward some event, idea, object, or other person(s), by using written or spoken words to convey information, feelings, or reasoning, or a combination thereof.[2] Persuasion is also an often used tool in the pursuit of personal gain, such as election campaigning, giving a sales pitch,[3] or in trial advocacy. Persuasion can also be interpreted as using one's personal or positional resources to change people's behaviors or attitudes. Systematic persuasion is the process through which attitudes or beliefs are changed by appeals to logic and reason. Heuristic persuasion on the other hand is the process through which attitudes or beliefs are changed because of appeals to habit or emotion.[4]

In selling technique, a sales presentation (or sales pitch) is a line of talk that attempts to persuade someone or something, with a planned sales presentation strategy of a product or service designed to initiate and close a sale of the product or service.

A sales pitch is a planned presentation of a product or service designed to initiate and close a sale of the same product or service. A sales pitch is essentially designed to be either an introduction of a product or service to an audience who knows nothing about it, or a descriptive expansion of a product or service that an audience has already expressed interest in. Sales professionals prepare and give a sales pitch, which can be either formal or informal, and might be delivered in any number of ways.

Narrative transportation theory proposes that when people lose themselves in a story, their attitudes and intentions change to reflect that story. The mental state of narrative transportation can explain the persuasive effect of stories on people, who may experience narrative transportation when certain contextual and personal preconditions are met, as Green and Brock[15] postulate for the transportation-imagery model. Narrative transportation occurs whenever the story receiver experiences a feeling of entering a world evoked by the narrative because of empathy for the story characters and imagination of the story plot.

Narrative transportation theory proposes that when people lose themselves in a story, their attitudes and intentions change to reflect that story. The mental state of narrative transportation can explain the persuasive effect of stories on people, who may experience narrative transportation when certain contextual and personal preconditions are met, as Green and Brock[1] postulate for the transportation-imagery model. As Van Laer, De Ruyter, Visconti, and Wetzels[2] elaborate further, narrative transportation occurs whenever the story receiver experiences a feeling of entering a world evoked by the narrative because of empathy for the story characters and imagination of the story plot. Given the implications of stories for the persuasion of people, nothing is less innocent than a story.


Defining the field of narrative transportation

Deighton, Romer, and McQueen[3]:335 anticipate the construct of narrative transportation by arguing that a story invites story receivers into the action it portrays and, as a result, makes them lose themselves in the story.[4] Gerrig[5] was the first to coin the notion of narrative transportation within the context of novels. Using travel as a metaphor for reading, he conceptualizes narrative transportation as a state of detachment from the world of origin that the story receiver—in his words, the traveler—experiences because of his or her engrossment in the story, a condition that Green and Brock[6] later describe as the story receiver’s experience of being carried away by the story. Notably, the state of narrative transportation makes the world of origin partially inaccessible to the story receiver, thus marking a clear separation in terms of here/there and now/before, or narrative world/world of origin.
Relevant features

Most research on narrative transportation follows the original definition of the construct. Scholars in the field constantly reaffirm the relevance of three features.

   Narrative transportation requires that people process stories—the acts of receiving and interpreting.
   Story receivers become transported through two main components: empathy and mental imagery. Empathy implies that story receivers try to understand the experience of a story character, that is, to know and feel the world in the same way. Thus, empathy offers an explanation for the state of detachment from the world of origin that is narrative transportation. In mental imagery, story receivers generate vivid images of the story plot, such that they feel as though they are experiencing the events themselves.
   When transported, story receivers lose track of reality in a physiological sense.

In accordance with these features, Van Laer et al.[2]:799 define narrative transportation as the extent to which

   an individual empathizes with the story characters and
   the story plot activates his or her imagination,

which leads him or her to experience suspended reality during story reception.
Similar constructs

Narrative transportation is a form of experiential response to narratives and thus is similar to other constructs, such as absorption, optimal experience or flow, and immersion. Yet several subtle, critical differences exist. Absorption refers to a personality trait or general tendency to be immersed in life experiences; transportation is an engrossing temporary experience. Flow is a more general construct (i.e., people can experience flow in a variety of activities), whereas transportation specifically entails empathy and mental imagery, which do not occur in flow experiences. Phillips and McQuarrie[7] demonstrate that immersion is primarily an experiential response to aesthetic and visual elements of images, whereas narrative transportation relies on a story with plot and characters, features that are not present in immersion.
Narrative persuasion

Since narrative transportation’s conceptualization, research has demonstrated that the transported “traveler” can return changed by the journey. Subsequent studies have confirmed that a story can engross the story receiver in a transformational experience, whose effects are strong and long-lasting. The transformation that narrative transportation achieves is persuasion of the story receiver. More specifically, Van Laer et al.'s[2] literature review reveals that narrative transportation can cause affective and cognitive responses, beliefs, and attitude and intention changes. However, the processing pattern of narrative transportation is markedly different from that in well-established models of persuasion.
Rival models

Before 2000, dual-process models of persuasion, especially the elaboration likelihood model and heuristic-systematic model, dominated persuasion research. These models attempt to explain why people accept or reject message claims. According to these models, the determination of a claim’s acceptability can result from careful evaluation of the arguments presented or from reliance on superficial cues, such as the presence of an expert. Whether receivers scrutinize a message depends on the extent to which they are able and motivated to process it systematically. As important variables, these models include empathy, familiarity, involvement, and the number and nature of thoughts the message evokes. If these variables are mainly positive, the receiver’s attitudes and intentions tend to be more positive; if the variables are predominantly negative, the resulting attitudes and intentions are more negative. These variables also exist in narrative persuasion.
Differences between analytical and narrative persuasion

Analytical persuasion and narrative persuasion differ depending on the role of involvement. In analytical persuasion, involvement depends on the extent to which the message has personally relevant consequences for a receiver’s money, time, or other resources. If these consequences are sufficiently severe, receivers evaluate the arguments carefully and generate thoughts related to the arguments. Yet, as Slater[8]:171 notes, even though severe consequences for stories are relatively rare, “viewers or readers of an entertainment narrative typically appear to be far more engrossed in the message.” This type of involvement, or narrative transportation, is arguably the crucial determinant of narrative persuasion.

Though the dual-process models provide a valid description of analytical persuasion, they do not encompass narrative persuasion. Analytical persuasion refers to attitudes and intentions developed from processing messages that are overtly persuasive, such as most lessons in science books, news reports, and speeches. However, narrative persuasion refers to attitudes and intentions developed from processing narrative messages that are not overtly persuasive, such as novels, movies, or video games. Addressing the strength and duration of the persuasive effects of processing stories, narrative transportation is a mental state that produces enduring persuasive effects without careful evaluation of arguments. Transported story receivers are engrossed in a story in a way that neither is inherently critical nor involves great scrutiny.
Sleeper effect

Narrative transportation seems to be more unintentionally affective than intentionally cognitive in nature. This way of processing leads to potentially increasing and long-lasting persuasive effects. Appel and Richter[9]:128 use the term “sleeper effect” to describe this paradoxical property of narrative transportation over time, which consists of a more pronounced change in attitudes and intentions and a greater certainty that these attitudes and intentions are correct.

Plausible explanations for the sleeper effect are twofold.

   According to poststructural research, language’s articulation in narrative format is capable not only of mirroring reality but also of constructing it. As such, stories could cause profound and durable persuasion of the transported story receiver as a result of his or her progressive internalization. When stories transport story receivers, not only do they present a narrative world but, by reframing the story receiver’s language, they also durably change the world to which the story receiver returns after the transportation experience.
   Research demonstrates that people analyze and retain stories differently from other information formats. For example, Deighton et al.[3] show that analytical advertisements stimulate cognitive responses whereas narrative advertisements are more likely to stimulate affective responses.

Following this line of reasoning, Van Laer et al.[2]:801 define narrative persuasion as

   the effect of narrative transportation, which manifests itself in story receivers’ affective and cognitive responses, beliefs, attitudes, and intentions from being swept away by a story and transported into a narrative world that modifies their perception of their world of origin.

The conceptual distinction between analytical persuasion and narrative persuasion and the theoretical framework of sound interpretation of narrative persuasion both ground the extended transportation-imagery model (ETIM).

One day in late October 1989, Amy received a phone call after school. He said he needed her help to pick out a present for her mother and had to keep it a secret. The man said he chose Amy because she could keep a better secret than her brother.

He convinced her to walk to the Bay Square Shopping Center Oct. 27. Then he talked her into calling McNulty to make sure she didn't worry.

But Amy couldn't keep a secret - she told two friends.  

The abductor had contacted Mihaljevic by telephone and arranged to meet her on the pretext of buying a gift for her mother because she had recently been promoted, as he told her. In November 2006 it was revealed that several other young girls had received phone calls similar to that to which Amy responded, during the weeks prior to Amy's abduction in 1989. These comprised requests from an unknown man, claiming to work with their mother, asking the girl to help him shop for a present to celebrate her mother's job promotion. The girls who received these calls lived in North Olmsted, a suburb near Bay Village; some had unlisted phone numbers

secret Santa wrote:
Secret Santa Visit

Carnes Account. "On December 25, 1996, while playing at the home of a neighborhood friend, JonBenet told her friend's mother that "Santa Claus" was going to pay her a "special" visit after Christmas and that it was a secret. (SMF P 124; PSMF P 124.) The person who may have said this to JonBenet has never been identified. (SMF P 125; PSMF P 125.)" (Carnes 2003:101).
PMPT Account. "Barbara Kostanick was the mother of a playmate of JBR's. She asserted: "The day before Christmas, JonBenet was at our house playing with Megan. The kids were talking about Santa, getting all excited. I asked JonBenet if she had visited Santa Claus yet. She said, “Oh, Santa was at our Christmas party the other night.” Megan had seen Santa at the Pearl Street Mall, so we talked about that. Then JonBenet said, “Santa Claus promised that he would make a secret visit after Christmas.” I thought she was confused. “Christmas is tonight,” I told her. “And Santa will be coming tonight.” “No, no” JonBenet insisted. “He said this would be after Christmas. And it’s a secret” (Schiller 1999:38-39)

Santa Claus, also known as Saint Nicholas, Father Christmas, Kris Kringle and simply "Santa", is a mythical figure with legendary, historical and folkloric origins who, in many Western cultures, is said to bring gifts to the homes of the good children on 24 December, the night before Christmas Day. However, in some European countries children receive their presents on St. Nicholas' Day, either the 6th or 19th of December.

The modern figure of Santa Claus is derived from the Dutch figure of Sinterklaas, whose name is a dialectal pronunciation of Saint Nicholas, the historical Greek bishop and gift-giver of Myra. During the Christianization of Germanic Europe, this figure may have absorbed elements of the god Odin, who was associated with the Germanic pagan midwinter event of Yule and led the Wild Hunt, a ghostly procession through the sky.

Santa Claus is generally depicted as a portly, joyous, white-bearded man—sometimes with spectacles—wearing a red coat with white collar and cuffs, white-cuffed red trousers, and black leather belt and boots and who carries a bag full of gifts for children. Images of him rarely have a beard with no moustache. This image became popular in the United States and Canada in the 19th century due to the significant influence of the 1823 poem "A Visit From St. Nicholas" and of caricaturist and political cartoonist Thomas Nast.[1][2][3] This image has been maintained and reinforced through song, radio, television, children's books and films.

Since the 20th century, in an idea popularized by the 1934 song "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town", Santa Claus has been believed to make a list of children throughout the world, categorizing them according to their behavior ("naughty" or "nice") and to deliver presents, including toys, and candy to all of the well-behaved children in the world, and sometimes coal to the naughty children, on the single night of Christmas Eve. He accomplishes this feat with the aid of the elves who make the toys in the workshop and the flying reindeer who pull his sleigh.[4][5] He is commonly portrayed as living at the North Pole and saying "ho ho ho" often.

"Santa Claus Is Coming to Town"[1] is a Christmas song. It was written by John Frederick Coots and Haven Gillespie and was first sung on Eddie Cantor's radio show in November 1934. It became an instant hit with orders for 100,000 copies of sheet music and more than 30,000 records sold within 24 hours.[2][3]

"A Visit from St. Nicholas", also known as "The Night Before Christmas" and " '​Twas the Night Before Christmas" from its first line, is a poem first published anonymously in 1823, and later attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, who acknowledged authorship in 1837.

The poem, which has been called "arguably the best-known verses ever written by an American",[1] is largely responsible for some of the conceptions of Santa Claus from the mid-nineteenth century to today. Prior to the poem, American ideas about St. Nicholas and other Christmastide visitors varied considerably. It became a popular poem which was set to music and was recorded by many artists.

Plot

On Christmas Eve night, while his wife and children sleep, a man awakens to noises outside his house. Looking out the window, he sees St. Nicholas in an air-borne sleigh pulled by eight reindeer. After landing his sleigh on the roof, the saint enters the house through the chimney, carrying a sack of toys with him. The man watches Nicholas filling the children's Christmas stockings hanging by the fire, and laughs to himself. They share a conspiratorial moment before the saint bounds up the chimney again. As he flies away, Saint Nicholas wishes everyone a "Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night."

Signature aspects are the offender’s motivational themes, or psychological needs, suggested by convergences of signature behaviors. They are thought to be relatively stable over time within offenders, although they are susceptible to the influences of fantasy development.