Article / Updated 03-26-2016
If you don't know what you're looking for, finding it is nearly impossible. Profiling, or looking at evidence and making a best guess as to the type of individual who would commit the crime in question, helps investigators get a firm grasp on whom it is they're trying to track down. The profiler, usually a specially trained FBI agent,looks at the crime scene, autopsy data, victim, and likely precrime and postcrime behaviors of the killer to make this assessment.