Introduction to Intelligence Studies288
small item from the victim to help them later relive the crime (“trophy” or
“souvenir”). is is referred to as ritual behavior—that activity that was
not necessary to commit the crime but which might provide insight into
an oender’s motivation and personality. If enough MO and ritual behav-
iors are discovered, the oender’s signature, or their own unique way of
committing the crime, might be revealed. In this way, serial crimes can be
linked together.
e FBI put these concepts into practice when it created the Violent
Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) in 1985. Law enforcement
agencies from throughout the United States submit both solved and unsolved
cases to ViCAP, where they are analyzed and ca