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Chapter three of the book "Losing Legitimacy: Street Crime and the Decline of Social Institutions in America," by Gary LaFree is presented. It examines the postwar street crime trends in the U.S. by the offender's age, gender and race. It identifies the characteristics of the offenders using the estimation of the specific combinations of factors including race, gender and age.

An encyclopedia entry for "profiler" in relation to crime is presented. It refers to the Behavioral Unit computer program of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which operates according to rules culled from investigative experience, such as most violent crime is intra-racial. Its prototype started with 150 rules and by 1990, it increased to 270 and still growing. Details about the crimes and the criminals are recorded in the Profiler, particularly about the victim and the state of the body.

An encyclopedia entry for "database" is presented. The initial database of the Behavioral Science Unit of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was compiled between 1979 and 1983 from interview conducted with 36 criminals. Of the 36 interviewees, twenty-five were serial killers who had terrible childhoods. The early success of the database survey technique known as Profiler was solving the murder of Francine Elveson.