Pat Brown - The Profiler - My Life Hunting Serial Killers & Psychopaths

All the elements of the murder indicated a violent sexual attack, including vaginal and anal rape, biting of sexual parts, and the removal of a sexual part.

It was not a drug hit, a revenge killing, or a robbery. Therefore, it did not matter who Sarah knew and associated with prior to the murder other than to indicate that she might have crossed the path of this killer and might have known him in some manner. The elements of this homicide indicated an experienced serial murderer, not a first-time accidental killing.

The evidence for this lies in the signature aspects of the crime rather than the MO. The fact that Sarah was lured, attacked, raped, and murdered by ligature does not prove an experienced killer. This MO merely shows that the perpetrator used those methods to assault and kill her. However, the fact that the perpetrator added a second coat hanger to the ligature configuration shows he had a more advanced knowledge of bondage methodology and, perhaps, prior experience with the use of ligatures.

The boldness of leaving the body in a public place ruled out the accidental killing by a well-known acquaintance or novice killer. Also, the fact that the victim was left faceup showed that the perpetrator had no guilt about this crime; in fact, he was damned proud of himself.

The ID left with the body was another bold move. The perpetrator had little fear that he would be identified as the killer. A rule of thumb among killers is to leave the body as far away as possible or as hidden as possible, allowing for the passage of time to obliterate evidence and the memories of any possible witnesses. Killers who leave a body where it will be easily found are extremely arrogant and confident that no one will connect them to the murder. If the perpetrator was well known to Sarah or served in the army with her, I doubt he would have left the body to be so quickly found.

If the perpetrator were in the military, it is also unlikely that he would have left a body with bite-mark evidence to be found; the marks would eventually have been matched up with army dental files.

The lack of any other major physical evidence such as body fluids or fingerprints is more support for the theory of a more experienced killer.

There is a relatively high chance that the killer was watching and possibly involving himself when the police were processing the crime scene. It is my belief that the perpetrator was a local resident, not in the military, and had connections to the crime scene area. He probably has lived in the area for quite a while and committed other murders or rapes and possibly other lesser crimes. He may or may not have a criminal record.

There was no evidence of two perpetrators involved in the crime. The particular kind of behaviors evidenced in this crime led me to believe this killer acted alone. The lesbian theory that was offered by some had absolutely no credibility.

The following is my analysis of the information derived from the murder evidence:

1. One individual committed the murder.

2. The murder was typical of a power-assertive rapist type.

3. No elements of the murder were extremely unusual in the MO.

4. The signature elements of the murder are as follows:

1. The use of an added coat hanger for the mouth.

2. The location of the body being placed in a very public location.

3. The leaving of the ID with the body.

4. The bite marks on the breast.

5. The excision of the right nipple.

5. The signature elements of the murder, while in combination point to a particular kind of personality, are not separately unusual in the history of sexual homicide.

6. The killer did not appear to have used a knife as a weapon in this homicide.

7. The vehicle used was most likely a panel van; the body of the victim was probably dumped from the right side of the van from the open sliding door of the vehicle.

8. There was no evidence of binding of the hands or feet.

9. The victim appeared to have been raped and murdered in the vehicle.

10. There was no evidence of torture.

11. There was evidence of extreme violence.

12. The entire event probably occurred in a relatively short time, between twenty and thirty minutes.

13. The perpetrator probably used some kind of pliers to twist the coat hangers. He may also have used an instrument to excise the nipple, perhaps a wire cutter.

14. The double-ringed circles on the buttocks of the victim provide evidence that following her death, the body was left in a supine position. It would appear that following her death by ligature, the perpetrator then rolled the victim onto her back and excised the right nipple. The buttocks rested on two lids that left the marks.

15. The two circles were the exact dimensions of the lids of sixteen-ounce Minwax cans of polyurethane, enamel, or wax. The warp in the measurements is likely due to the removal of the can lids by prying them up with an instrument of some kind. There may have been other possible sources of these circular marks, but we should be careful not to base any investigative avenues on sources that have not been proven to be of those exact dimensions described in the autopsy report.

16. The prioritizing of the suspect list should have been based on the following:

1. The suspect must have a power-assertive rapist personality.

2. The suspect must have access to a panel van or similar vehicle.

3. The suspect must be relatively strong.

4. The suspect must have no relationship or a minimal relationship with the victim.

5. The suspect must have some connection to activities using Minwax, pliers, and coat hangers.

6. The suspect must be very familiar with the area where the victim’s body was left.

7. The suspect, having no guilt about the murder of Sarah, most likely has psychopathic personality traits.

The suspects that I determined deserved top priority in this investigation were as follows:

1. Suspect #3.

2. Suspect #2.

3. An unknown guy-some man described in one report as having lived in the area and who cut off a woman’s clothing and bit her breasts: this behavior was consistent with a power-assertive rapist.

4. Any new suspect that came to light who matched the characteristics of the profile.

THE ANDREWS FAMILY was furious.

She was not killed on army grounds, but there was an army investigation. The Andrews family thought the army did a pitiful job and failed to do what it could to locate whoever killed Sarah. There was a sense on their part that the army abandoned Sarah, one of their own.

I received a lot of notes from her parents over the course of my investigation that showed their frustration. The case eventually ended up in the hands of the local police department, where one detective worked the case and then another. Neither one solved it.

The family also became very angry at me at one point.

Families of victims, when they get frustrated, tend to take it out on the professional people around them. I did a lot of work on this case and came up with a solid profile-and I did it for free. At one point, I uploaded information about the crime to the Sexual Homicide Exchange Web site. Mrs. Andrews had told me that it was okay for me to post certain details about the case-including that Sarah’s nipple was cut off-but Sarah’s father went absolutely berserk.

“How dare you put that detail about my daughter up on a Web site?” he screamed.

The Andrews family stopped talking to me at that point.

I did it because we were seeking more information, and there is a tendency in certain crimes to repeat behaviors. If somebody knew of a crime where an attacker similarly brutalized a woman’s breasts and nipples, it would be a valuable thing to discover. And I wasn’t the first one to put it out there; the police had talked about it before, the detail had appeared in some papers, and this was nine years after the crime occurred. It wasn’t something only they and the offender knew or at this point would hurt the case.