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John Douglas, one of the FBI’s leading criminal profilers, will speak on highlights from his career at 8 p.m., Wednesday, April 7, in Colton Chapel at Lafayette College. The talk is free and open to the public. Douglas is the former head of the Bureau’s pioneering Investigative Support Unit and served as the inspiration for the character of Jack Crawford in Thomas Harris’s best-selling novel The Silence of the Lambs, whose film version, starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins, won the Academy Award as Best Picture of 1992. His career has also been tapped as source material for numerous television series, including The X-Files.
For 25 years, Douglas used criminal profiling techniques to hunt down some of the most notorious and sadistic criminals of this era. Douglas has interviewed and studied dozens of serial killers and assassins including Charles Manson, Sirhan Sirhan, and John Wayne Gacy, and has aided law enforcement officials from around the world using the study of behavioral science.
In a unique and compelling style, Douglas describes the methodology behind criminal profiling. Drawing upon experiences from his extraordinary career, he examines a typical crime investigation, illustrating the surreal chess game played between an elite squad of investigators and deviant criminal minds.
John Douglas, who holds a doctorate in education, is the author of numerous works on criminology. He has co-authored several national bestsellers with Mark Olshaker, including Obsession, Mind Hunter, and Unabomer: On the Trail of America’s Most Wanted Serial Killer. His books Sexual Homicide: Patterns and Motives and Motives and Crime Classification Manual are considered landmark criminal studies.