Tuesday's Tidbits with Kari: Featuring Forensic Psychologist Katherine Ramsland

Please welcome the fabulous Katherine Ramsland. I'm sure we can all learn tons of incredible tidbits from her.

Kari: Your background is amazing and your books so helpful to the mystery, suspense, thriller writer. Can you tell us a little about your latest release THE FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGY OF CRIMINAL MINDS?

Katherine: Previously, I had written The Forensic Science of CSI, The Science of Cold Case Files, True Stories of CSI, and the The CSI Effect to show what was real in these television shows, to expand on certain methods and practices, and to present the cases that inspired some of the plots. I have done a lot of writing with former FBI profilers and I thought that there should be a book about the Behavioral Analysis Unit -- how it started, what it's like now, and what these agents actually do (as opposed to how they're portrayed). I also knew most of the cases they relied on for plots. In addition, Criminal Minds calls on certain aspects of forensic psychology to expand its repertoire, so I thought it would be a good idea to lay out the areas of forensic psychology that inform criminal profiling, interrogation, testimony, psychological autopsy, and other areas of criminal investigative analysis. I teach several courses (online, undergad and grad) in forensic psychology, so most of the material comes from my courses.

Kari: What's involved in forensic psychology?

Katherine: The behavioral sciences -- psychiatry, psychology, sociology, counseling, and social work -- interface with investigation and the law in numerous ways, reflecting a rich relationship. While the psychiatry/psychology and criminal law intersection is the area most people know, there are numerous civil, employment, and family court matters in which mental health consultation also informs the courts. Also, the behavioral sciences address issues of vital policy interest. False confessions, eyewitness memory, sexual harassment, gay adoption, and securities fraud are a sampling of controversial disputes where mental health consultation and research elevates legal decision-making above the pedestrian or salacious. Forensic psychiatry and psychology extend beyond traditional notions of the behavioral sciences that activity is limited to the consultation room. Activities include record review, witness interviewing, house calls and crime scene visits, probing various forms of evidence ranging from videotaped interviews to cell phone records, tax returns to favorite websites visited on the Internet. And, of course, forensic matters also involve depositions and trial, embedding the behavioral sciences within the process of justice.

Kari: You've been a therapist, a crisis counselor, a psycho-educator, and now teach forensic psychology at a university as well as being a writer. What do you enjoy doing the most?

Katherine: Writing. I learn most from writing and while I'm not altogether reclusive, I do prefer my home office to any other place. Second is teaching workshops in my field.

Kari: You've written for TV, magazines, articles, and dabbled in journalism and non-fiction books. Any chance you'll write a fiction novel?

Katherine: I've published 16 short stories and two novels, "The Heat Seekers" and "The Blood Hunters." They involve confronting vampires with modern methods in forensics. They were based on my experiences when I went undercover into the vampire subcultures during the 1990s, in response to reports of a missing journalist. Factually, I wrote Piercing the Darkness, but fictionally, I wrote the novels. I think they're now out of print, but they're still available. I have other plans as well, but it's bad mojo to describe them.

Kari: You've appeared all over TV on shows like the Today Show, the Discovery Channel, and Unsolved Mysteries just to name a few of the many. What has that been like and what's the most interesting program you've appeared on and why?

Katherine: Recently, I was named the recurring expert for a series about ritual crimes, which should be interesting. The TV experience has ranged from exasperating to terrific. I love working with Forensic Files because they're careful about my time, always prepared, and very clear about my role on the show. The same goes for 48 Hours and 20/20. I've done some where they take up an entire day only to give me a line or two -- and usually the dumbest things I said. I hate that. On the positive side, we've had several teams come to film my students building or investigating our crime scene where I teach Psychological Sleuthing (DeSales University), and that's been fun all around, because they often bring in students from the TV/Film department as well. It's a team effort and the students get very excited. Unsolved Mysteries is always fun because it usually involves ghosts. I'm getting a bit tired of the vampire filming because the questions and narratives are always the same. I was really psyched about doing a unique show about vampire exhumations, but it turned out they couldn't find any. My favorite subject, of course, is serial murder, so I'm always happy to do those shows, no matter what crew requests it. One thing I don't like very much is when a producer thinks I need a pre-interview, so by the time the actual interview rolls around, it feels stale and rehearsed to me. I've been doing this for 20 years. I've learned how to do soundbites.

Kari: What has it been like working with actual FBI profilers?

Katherine: Terrific. I started with John Douglas, who hired me to research and provide reports for his book, "The Cases that Haunt Us," and we'd role-play like I was an investigator in need of his services. That was a lot of fun. Then I interviewed other profilers at length, adding to what I knew, and finally co-wrote Gregg McCrary's casebook, "The Unknown Darkness: Profiling the Predators among Us." We went through his files so I saw plenty of crime scene photos and analysis. (On a side note, we were looking at his investigation of the Buddhist temple massacre in Arizona on the very day that CSI had turned this incident into an episode. I must say, the real case was far more interesting. Since then, I've worked on articles with profilers and have even offered some basic advice to local police departments. I've also been called in as an expert for a couple of my own special areas, healthcare serial killers and vampire crimes. I don't call myself a profiler, because I lack background experience and formal training, but I do know how it works. Even so, I prefer to do a psychological autopsy.

Kari: After a 2 year investigation of the vampire subculture and your study of Anne rice and Dean Koontz, why do you think our society is so obsessed with vampires?

Katherine: When you look at the times at which vampires become a hot topic, you see that it's often at the end of a significant time period -- a century, a decade, a millennium. Lots of people think this vampire craze is the biggest ever, but it's not. The end of the 1980s and 1990s had the same thing. I think it could be a way, collectively, to defy the feeling of temporal closure, to identify with immortals as a way to give the finger to Father Time. No monster is as sexy as a vampire and while there's nothing new in this recent frenzy, we continue to give vampires the allure of mystery, power, and total behavioral license. So, they're attractive and frightening at the same time -- the fullest possible life but also closer to death than we typically want to be. This makes them edgy as metaphors and as characters.

Kari: You coined the term "ghosting" while investigating the other side. You say the well equipped ghost hunter relies on digital technology. I know on your website under the ghosts tab you have a few recordings of voices from the other side. What was the scariest, most bizarre experience you encounterd in your own studies?

Katherine: It's difficult to scare me, frankly. I suppose that when I was alone in the woods with a "vampire" who told me he had killed people with a vampire partner, who had then killed himself to become a ghost inhabiting the first guy, that was pretty risky. Supposedly this ghost inhabited a ring, which I then took, and this is what launched my book, "Ghost." So that was a scary situation, as were a few haunted places I investigated alone. I do look for unique people, like the mistress of the house of death or the necrophile who drank blood from corpses, but they don't scare me. I'm not sure I could tell you a truly scary situation, since I'm driven by curiosity and I tend to move toward what others flee. Maybe one scary time was when I was first recording ghost voices and I was in a cemetery at midnight as a storm was moving in. I recorded a harsh-sounding voice that said, "Why are you doing this to us?" I left. At once. But today, I'd probably stay and find out more.

Thank you so much Katherine. Your answers have been so informative and fascinating. To find out more about Katherine Ramsland and what she's up to, go to her website at: http://www.katherineramsland.com/