Alum Kim Rossmo lauded in Pickton report

Criminal profiler Kim Rossmo (BA '78) is one of the College of Arts & Science's first 100 Alumni of Influence.

Former Sask. man lauded in Pickton report
By Jason Warick, The StarPhoenix December 31, 2012

Former VPD officer Kim Rossmo arrives at Federal Court in Vancouver to testify before the missing women inquiry on Tuesday, January 24, 2012.
Photograph by: Glenn Baglo, PNG

Vancouver police should have listened to a former Saskatoon man who warned them a serial killer - later found to be Robert Pickton - was murdering women, stated a massive report into the case.

"That was a frustrating time for me. I wish those women would still be alive," criminologist Kim Rossmo said following a visit home to Saskatoon for the holidays.

"Now nothing can be done to bring these women back, but this (report) is a recipe for avoiding future tragedies."

Rossmo, a graduate of Brunskill Elementary School and Evan Hardy Collegiate, was working as a Vancouver police officer at the time of the Pickton killings. He tried without success to get his colleagues and superiors to consider the dozens of missing women, many of them prostitutes, as possible victims of a serial killer.

Pickton was eventually discovered and is serving a life sentence in prison for six murders after a 2007 conviction. He allegedly told an undercover officer he has killed a total of 49 women.

In a recently released report of more than 1,000 pages, former British Columbia attorney-general Wally Op-pal criticizes Vancouver city police and RCMP for their lack of co-operation, poor investigations and for failures to communicate within individual departments. Oppal also accused officers of being "disengaged" on the cases of the missing women.

Rossmo said no one would want to go to a mechanic whose mind was on his next golf game, so why would we expect less from police?

"That was very frustrating for me and for other people who had become convinced the women had been murdered," he said.

"Hopefully next time around, there will be careful attention paid."

Rossmo hopes the lessons learned in the Pickton case and illuminated by Oppal's report can help investigators in other cities.

"The implications are not related to just one province," he said. "This can happen in Victoria. This can happen in Saskatoon."

In 1995, Rossmo became Canada's first police officer to earn a doctorate. He pioneered the science of geographic profiling. His techniques are used to investigate crimes around the world, and also to track potential terrorist activity, animal foraging and other applications. He now works as a criminologist at Texas State University near Austin.
© Copyright (c) The StarPhoenix

Read more: http://www.thestarphoenix.com/news/Former+Sask+lauded+Pickton+report/7759319/story.html#ixzz2GqRfPSHR