Obsession (15 page)

He might cover the victim’s eyes or mask his own features both for the self-preservation motive of preventing identification as well as the possibility that he knows he should be ashamed of his actions. He is timid and will do whatever the victim allows him to. Rather than tear off her clothes or force her to strip, he may only expose the parts of the victim’s body he intends to assault. He is apt to keep a journal, news clippings, or some other record of his assaults to reassure himself of his potency, and for the same reason he may take souvenirs, often pieces of the victim’s underwear. Afterward, he may feel guilty or remorseful. But unless this is a “one off,” who tries it, doesn’t like it, and decides never to do it again, he
will
do it again. He will keep raping until he is caught or stopped in some other way, such as being killed or seriously injured in another crime or other unrelated incident.

He lives alone or with parents or in some other type of dependent relationship. His mother probably was—or is domineering. He’s employed below his ability level in a job that doesn’t require a lot of contact with the public. While this is the least physically dangerous type of rapist, if he’s successful over a series of attacks, his confidence can be boosted and he may become more physically aggressive.

Joseph Thompson, the South Auckland rapist, was of the power-reassurance classification, and if you’re unfortunate enough to come in contact with a rapist, it’s the type you’re most likely to encounter.

The Exploitative Rapist
is a more impulsive predator. His crimes are more the result of seizing an opportunity that presents itself rather than of fantasizing ahead of time about what the act is going to be like. He might approach the potential victim with a ruse or con, or it could be a direct, overpowering blitz-style attack. Unlike the power-reassurance rapist, this type will not appear concerned with the victim’s welfare. He is selfish—verbally, physically, and sexually. He may suffer some form of sexual dysfunction, and if he does, it will be just as apparent with his wife, girlfriend, or any other consenting partner as it will be with a victim of force. Sexual dysfunction often centers around retarded ejaculation or difficulty in reaching climax at all. Victims of preference will tend to be around his own age. He is on the prowl for a victim of opportunity, and this could take place in a bar or a neighborhood he’s targeted. Once he has a woman in his control, his only real concern is getting her to submit sexually to him. That is the real thrill for him—the sex act is satisfying as an act of domination and control rather than as providing what we think of as sexual gratification. Once he’s forced her submission, as far as he is concerned, the experience is over. But
during that encounter, he can be expected to inflict multiple assaults on the victim. Anal assaults are common. Masks or attempts at disguising or hiding his face are uncommon. With this type of offender, there will often be an interval between rapes—a day, a month, six months—until he once again goes on the hunt, but unlike the power-reassurance rapist, he won’t try to maintain any contact with or come back to a victim once he has left her, although he often threatens to return if she reports the assault to police.

This type will be very body-conscious. He will want a macho reputation, to be known as a man’s man, and therefore is likely to have some physically oriented employment. He’s very interested in sports. His vehicle will reflect that image, too. In some regions of the country, it would be a Corvette or some muscle car; in others, it might be a pickup well-equipped for hunting. He does not take well to criticism or authority. He probably didn’t do well in high school or go on to college. Not surprisingly, if he is married, he will have a history of cheating on his wife and paying scant attention to his children. When we look into the background of offenders like this, we often find that his father treated his mother the same way he treats women.

Ronnie Shelton was an exploitative rapist. Next to the power-reassurance rapist, this type is the most common, although it still represents only one of every ten rapists.

The Anger Rapist
is just what the name implies. Also referred to as the angerretaliatory rapist, his sexual assault is a displaced expression of the rage and anger within him. For this type, the victim represents the person, or group of people, the offender hates. This could be a mother, a wife, or a girlfriend, or even women in general if the guy feels a grudge against
them. The point is, this person’s motivation doesn’t have to be rooted in an actual or legitimate wrong perpetrated against him. It would not be unusual for this type to have an ongoing relationship with a woman. And because he is driven by rage, the consequences of the anger rapist’s attack can be anything from verbal abuse to a severe beating to murder, though since his conscious or subconscious intention is to get the anger out of his system, this type usually will not kill.

His attacks will be episodic, not at any predictable intervals, triggered by precipitating Stressors involving the woman or women to whom his rage is actually directed. In almost all cases, the displacement means that he will not attack that person. He may even attack someone else he knows, using weapons of opportunity such as kitchen knives, or even just his fists if he’s strong enough. Because he wants not just to overpower but to humiliate his target, there could be anal sex followed by oral sex, he will use a great deal of profanity, and the context of the behavior will be intention to degrade, such as ejaculating on the victim’s face or clothing.

As readers of our previous book
Journey into Darkness
will remember, the late Timothy Spencer (executed in 1994) was an anger rapist. This type is far less common than either of the previous two, possibly as little as 5 percent of total rapists.

The Sadistic Rapist
is, in many ways, the most dangerous sexual predator of all. The purpose of his attack is to live out his sadistic sexual fantasies on the unwilling victim. With this type, sexual fantasy and aggression merge, which is why he’s also referred to as an anger-excitation rapist. Aggression and sadistic fantasy feed on each other, so as the level of aggression rises, so does his level of arousal. His aggression is not anger-based as
it is with the previous category. In fact, he can be quite charming and seductive as he lures his intended prey into his web. He is completely self-centered. The only thing he cares about is his own pleasure and satisfaction. He simply gets off on hurting people, on having them in his power. Therefore, with this type we’ll see various forms of mental and physical torture, and the physical torture may be directed particularly at sexually significant parts of the body such as mouth, breasts, genitals, buttocks, and rectum. His weapon of choice is often a knife because it is so intimidating and causes mental anguish. He will often cut or tear off the victim’s clothing because he figures she will not need it anymore after he has finished with her.

Depending on his preferences, there may be a lot of sex, probably highly perverse in nature, or even none. He could, for example, prefer to penetrate with a sharp object rather than with his penis. His language will be commanding and degrading, but impersonal. The victim is merely there as an actress in his self-scripted drama, and her role is to show fear and respond to pain. There is, therefore, often a victim of preference, symbolic to him in some way, be she old or young, white, black, or Asian, slim or full-figured, black-haired or blond, redhead or brunette.

The sadistic rapist anticipates his crime, in fact has perfected his MO over his criminal career. As his fantasy evolves and he gains more experience with different victims, he will take more time planning for successive crimes. He brings his weapon with him and may have a torture kit made up, including pliers or other sharp instruments, whips, manacles, needles, whatever he needs to fulfill his fantasy. Since his assault unfolds over a long time, he will have a place to which he can take his victim where he knows he will not be disturbed. This might be an obscure cabin in the woods or a specially outfitted and soundproofed
van. He may tell the victim that if she does what he tells her to, he won’t hurt her any further or he’ll let her go, but this is only a ruse to control her and get her to cooperate. Because his satisfaction lies in tormenting and dominating his victim, he may take photographs or record the scene as it is unfolding on either audio- or videotape. For the same reason, he may also take souvenirs to help him relive the experience whenever he wants and demonstrate to himself that he “owns” the victim. These souvenirs might include jewelry, items either of clothing or underwear, or even body parts.

The attack will tend to be highly symbolic. There will be no remorse because the rapist has totally depersonalized his victim; he doesn’t even think of her as a human being. This is the type of rape that most often ends in murder. In fact, killing the victim may be an integral part of the sadistic fantasy scenario. He may continue to engage in activity with the body after death. It is generally impossible to play on his sympathy, because he has none. He wants his victim to suffer. The only instance in which he might relent is if the victim can somehow break through the depersonalization and get him to regard her as an individual. I have known this to occur, for example, one time when a woman stated that her husband had cancer. It happened that the rapist’s own brother was battling cancer, and so he let her go. Another time, a sadistic rapist told me that one of his victims reminded him of his mother, and so he released her. Unfortunately, this is an uncommon scenario with the sexual sadist.

The sadistic type is usually white, with above-normal intelligence, and may be college-educated with a good middle-class job. He will have a dominant personality and collect bondage and sadomasochistic pornography. He may also collect related items, such as knives, guns, or Nazi memorabilia, and read military, law enforcement,
or survivalist literature. He may have a large attack-type dog such as a German shepherd, Doberman, or rottweiler. Because of his intelligence and planning, he will be difficult to apprehend.

The late Steven Pennell (executed in 1992), the so-called I-40 Killer, in Delaware, who picked up prostitutes along Interstate 40, then raped, tortured, and murdered them in the back of his specially equipped van, was a sadistic rapist. This is the least common variety.

As we all know, human nature is not exact, and not every rapist is cooperative enough to fit neatly into one of these four categories. There is often a mixed presentation, with elements of one classification grafting onto the general description of another, which is why it is so difficult to give specific advice on how to react to a sexual criminal, particularly under the acute stress of the attack itself. But in the great majority of cases, one category will dominate, and our reaction should be molded around the understanding of what motivates that type of rapist and what he is after.

Even with the areas of overlap or crossover, it is tremendously helpful to understand the type of offender we’re dealing with in each case. The point of classification is to provide potential victims—and investigators if it comes to that—with an understanding of the rapist’s individual obsession. Motive is a tough call in most rape cases, compared to those in neater, easier-to-define crimes, such as burglary, for example. If a potential victim understands an assailant’s motive—what he’s after—she may be able to defuse him or otherwise deal with the situation before he has the opportunity to harm her. And if we in law enforcement understand our UNSUB’s obsession, we may recognize what type of beast we’re dealing with and
be able to tailor our investigation, prosecution, and sentencing accordingly.

Linda Fairstein has been a New York City prosecutor since 1972. Since 1976, she has been chief of the Sex Crimes Unit of the District Attorney’s Office. She is also an accomplished author, both of the highly respected
Sexual Violence: Our War Against Rape
and two well-received crime novels. Her personal obsession has led to meaningful changes in rules, procedure, police and public attitudes toward sexual assault, and greater confidence in the ability of the legal system to render justice. Her own journey from a suburban childhood to college and a prestigious law school to urban hero in a relentless job that is admittedly not for the squeamish is a saga of dawning awareness of the dimensions of rape and what it has done to us as a society.

Like most of us who deal with rape, she credits the women’s movement with focusing attention at a time when nobody else seemed interested. But one thing that disturbed her was the common claim that rape was actually a crime of violence, and that it wasn’t about sex. She notes, “That bothered me, because I’d handled every other kind of assault and it’s different. It’s not beating someone over the head with the baseball bat. It’s not using hands and fists. There is a sexual element to this that isn’t part of any other crime, and that can’t be denied. It’s very much the piece of the crime that the victim doesn’t want to happen or is afraid of. And so to me, it was about the one weapon that this type of offender had that other offenders don’t use and victims don’t want used against them.”

What Fairstein came up with, and it’s as good a thumbnail analysis as any I’ve heard, is that rape is a crime of violence in which sex is the weapon. That’s what distinguishes it from every other violent crime,
and that is at the heart of what makes it so traumatic and so difficult to prosecute effectively. For example, we’ve already noted that sexual assault is the one violent crime in which there is often widespread speculation about whether the victim somehow contributed to her predicament. Did she lead him on? Was she “asking for it” with what she said … how she was acting … what she was wearing … or not wearing?

It may not be the wisest move in the world to carry thousands of dollars in cash on a city street, but do we say that someone who does is asking to be robbed? Do we say that someone who drives a shiny new Ferrari is asking to be carjacked? Do we say that because he was rich and famous and talented, John Lennon was asking to be murdered?