Managing a Multi-jurisdictional

Serial Homicide Task Force

The challenges in establishing and managing a multi-jurisdictional serial homicide task force go beyond anything found elsewhere in law enforcement. A complex serial homicide case can stretch the resources of even a large department, try the skill and experience of even the best detective and erode public confidence in the most stalwart agency. Recent history contains many examples of successful serial investigations where the suspect was identified, captured and prosecuted. Unfortunately, it also contains many examples of serial investigations where the suspect has eluded law enforcement and the case has gone unsolved. The difference seems to be in how the investigating team was staffed, organized, managed, and how they obtained and applied information technology.

Perhaps the most important thing to be accomplished early in the investigation is to establish an accurate and comprehensive list of possible victims. This will require a thorough review of all homicides in all contiguous jurisdictions over a period, which encompasses the broadest possible time frame. Serial killers rarely start with sophisticated crimes. They often dabble and make mistakes, occasionally even allowing a potential victim to escape. These early crimes cannot, must not be overlooked. They may provide the key to a solution.

Planning

Very, very few police departments who have not already handled a serial homicide case will have properly prepared themselves for this eventuality. Serial homicide cases rarely present themselves as such. Agencies are often caught using traditional investigative methods when the second, third or fourth victim surfaces and they realize that they have a non-traditional investigation on their hands. Yet proper planning is crucial to the successful resolution of such a case. It is never too late to stop briefly and reevaluate the investigation. Strategic planning basically focuses on three issues, which are largely political rather than operational. The first is commitment.

How many resources can be marshaled for this case? How many investigators, how many police cars, radios, computers, office space, overtime and so on? How can we afford to backfill these positions? What will be the fair share for each jurisdiction, which participates? How will the players be chosen and how will we maintain morale among those who were not. These questions go directly to commitment and can only be answered by political leadership. The second issue is funding.

Serial homicide cases are not cheap. Done properly, you are essentially forming another, although smaller, police department whose only focus must be the capture of a single suspect. How do we create and fund a budget for this operation? Where will the money come from? Who can, and more importantly, who will help us? Can other effected local jurisdictions participate? Will the state or the federal government provide financial relief if the costs become more than local budgets can bear? Once again, these questions can only be answered by political leadership.

And finally, if success is not immediate, how long can we keep this up? More than one serial case has gone cold because the agency could no longer afford to maintain an expensive task force. Strategic planning is designed to answer these and other questions, which must be addressed sooner or later. In the highly charged atmosphere surrounding such a high profile case, sooner is always better than later.

General Planning covers a much broader spectrum and includes creating plans, which will cover eventualities almost certain to arise during the conduct of the investigation. Some examples include:

• How can the Task Force be assured that it will be notified immediately if a crime scene is discovered in another jurisdiction.
• How can the Task Force be assured that it will be invited to participate in the development of that crime scene.
• Is it possible to know whether known suspects can be motivated to kill again in the near future and how will the Task Force respond to such an event.
• How will the Task Force respond if a patrol officer makes an in progress arrest of a suspect matching our criteria.
• How, when and where will the Task Force conduct the interrogation necessary to elicit a confession.

These are but a few of the likely eventualities which general planning should address. These plans may be formulated during the conduct of the investigation, but they should be in place as early as possible.

Staffing

Staffing of a task force operation must be carefully considered. A serial investigation requires staffing at a significantly higher level than a traditional homicide case. The scope and complexity of such an investigation requires resources unparalleled in a traditional investigation. For example, to make effective use of successful serial investigative techniques such as Time-lining your victims and suspects requires the investment of significant work on the part of investigators, crime analysis officers and clerical staff. The development of a crime scene/dump site may require the un-divided attention of as many as 25 investigators and criminalists for several days. Tip Sheets must be evaluated and prioritized by crime analysis personnel and assigned for follow-up quickly. Any new victim or other development usually results in a flurry of new information, which must be worked immediately. Such an operation usually requires a dedicated PIO to handle the endless requests by the media and others and to provide a single voice for the Task Force. Any information technology dedicated to the Task Force must be located and managed on site. This means a dedicated IT person with the appropriate clearances. A street or tactical unit to handle undercover activities, surveillance and other such tasks is a must. There are many staffing requirements and issues which must be addressed including how to backfill the FTE’s assigned to the Task Force. Life and police work go on outside this investigation and failure to properly address that workload can seriously affect morale elsewhere in the department. That in turn can curtail desperately needed intra-departmental cooperation.

Organization

The organization of the Task Force will be an important element in the success of the mission. The Task Force manager must be a seasoned homicide supervisor who has absolute authority to manage the day-to-day activities of the group. He/She must also have absolute authority over all Task Force personnel regardless of which jurisdiction they come from. To facilitate communication, one jurisdiction should provide all radios and cellular phones so that every member of the group can be in constant contact.

Investigators should be divided into teams of no more than five with a first line supervisor for each team. A street crimes or tactical unit, which can operate undercover, is necessary to conduct certain operations as well as surveillance, dump site cover and special projects. These detectives can also be tasked with investigative follow-up when the need arises. A crime analysis team is absolutely essential. A supervisor with such experience should lead this team. This team is responsible for collecting and processing every piece of information, which comes into the Task Force. One member of the team must see and hear everything produced or collected by the rest of the group. This member must develop and maintain a global picture of the case on a daily basis.

Adequate clerical staff must be assigned. I cannot over-emphasize the need for competent clerical staff. Unless you want your investigators doing this kind of work instead of investigating, serious attention must be given to this element of Task Force operations.

Information Management

Information management will be the linchpin of the investigation. Serial homicide cases typically produce vastly more information than a traditional homicide case. The higher the case profile, the more information that will be produced. If this information cannot be properly managed, it will quickly become a curse rather than a blessing. Some form of information technology is essential to both case and information management. A competent physical catalog or storage system as well as an automated database should be constructed very early in the investigation. You must know exactly what you have, where it is in the database, it’s significance and it must be immediately available to every investigator. Only then can you make proper use of it.

An automated system will insure that each detective knows what every detective knows as soon as it is loaded. A powerful local area network is relatively inexpensive. Numerous workstations insure that data can be loaded while inquiries are in progress. The ability to cross-index and cross reference data means that investigators can retrieve information through an Ad Hoc search. This powerful capability allows investigators and analysis officers to synthesize information. Laptops issued to each investigator will speed the construction and uploading of investigative notes and also allow management to better track assignments and productivity.

The physical storage system should mirror the automated system. A series of books should be established for each victim, suspect, significant associate and the master case. Within these books are a series of information categories, which are clearly indexed. The categories and their sequence correspond with a careful analysis of the progression of a serial homicide investigation. All books are organized in exactly the same way so that an investigator will find the same information in the same place in each and every book. Each document within the book is assigned a sequence number based on a system, which directly relates to significant pieces of information about the subject matter. These sequence numbers are cross-referenced to your automated database so that any specific piece of information extracted from the computer can be related to the original document.

Managing a multi-jurisdictional serial homicide task force is difficult…but not impossible. Solving such a case is difficult…but not impossible. The application of talented and dedicated detectives, careful planning, sufficient resources and a good information management system will usually insure success. The lack of any one of these elements may mean failure.

This brief overview is by no means a complete blueprint of how to manage a successful investigation. Unfortunately, managing such an investigation can only be learned by doing.

Jackson Beard is a 30 year veteran of the King County Sheriff’s Office in Seattle. He spent 4 years as one of the deputy commanders on the Green River Task Force. He has also worked numerous other serial crimes including the Paul Keller Serial Spree Arsons and the New Orleans Area Prostitute Murders. He has also worked a number of local cases where quick response, organization and follow-up resulted in capturing the suspect at only two or three kills.

Permission is granted to reprint this article with attribution to the author, OfficerResource.com and a link to the original source here. -Xiphos

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