Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 10, 1993 TAG: 9310100158
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder Newspapers
DATELINE: PETALUMA, CALIF. LENGTH: Medium
Indeed, the tall, bearded man who slipped inside her bedroom Oct. 1 was making a conscious choice: It was 12-year-old Polly Hannah Klaas he wanted, not her two 12-year-old friends staying over - Kate, the strawberry blonde, or Gillian, a heavier, shorter-haired brunette. Not Polly's mother, Eve, nor her 6-year-old stepsister, Annie.
"He picked this kid out; Polly was the one he wanted," says John Philpin, a forensic psychologist in Vermont who specializes in profiling violent criminals. "He may have seen her weeks before, or he may have just seen her earlier that night; but he has seen her, he's selected her as the one who fits his fantasy."
As shocking as it is for this city of 43,000 just south of Santa Rosa, the daring abduction of Polly Klaas is only one of 20 cases of its kind reported to police across the country in the past three years, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
All of the children were kidnapped from their homes while their parents or other adults were present. Some were dropped off a few hours or days later. Some were killed. Of the 3,200 to 4,600 nonfamily abductions of children every year, only 200 to 400 of them involve situations where the child is kept for an extended period of time and taken more than 50 miles away.
The men who do such things - and they are almost always men - are usually white, usually young and have broken the law before, according to Philpin, who has spent more than 10 years researching and interviewing violent offenders.
From details provided to police by the two girls who were not taken, Philpin says Polly's abductor was a man in control.
Philpin's psychological profile comes one day after the FBI called in Polly's father, Marc, to help with their own profile of her abductor - an interview police say is routine. Mary Ellen O'Toole, the FBI's behavioral science expert on the West Coast, has been on the case since Oct. 2. Both she and Philpin base their profiles on the nature of the crime, on what wasn't done, as much as what was - and on what both call the abductor's "comfort zone."
But unlike the FBI, which refuses to discuss the case, Philpin says releasing details "helps people to think. They may know a heavy-set guy with a beard who's comfortable with kids, who prefers the company of kids, seems awkward when dealing with adults. Someone whose relationships with female peers repeatedly failed.
"And maybe they'll call up and say, `This may be nothing, but I know this guy.' "
What Philpin believes is this: Whoever stole Polly has been arrested before. He likes to drive, relentlessly looking for victims. And he's very, very careful.
"This sounds fairly deliberate, controlled, planned, which reinforces my belief that he has a criminal record, that he's in the [national crime] computer," Philpin says. "It may be for breaking and entering or burglary, but he has prior convictions."
The abductor didn't rape anyone at the home or take any valuables.
"He will have thought in advance of what he's going to do, where he's going to go," Philpin said. "That is part of his comfort zone. Whether it's in the woods or in a building, he's checked it out and knows it's safe, that he won't be bothered. It's someplace where he can spend a period of time and not have to worry about anyone seeing him or interrupting him.
"He's sufficiently good with kids to know what makes sense to them. And given the lack of concern about his face being seen by the other girls, in all likelihood the man was not from that neighborhood and maybe not from Petaluma."
by CNB