I don't think anyone would dismiss certain profiling techniques outright as nonsense, after all, that is what detectives have always done to develop leads and narrow down suspects; they just didn't start calling it that until recently due to our penchant for competency documentation and certification among careerists.

After all, if you're looking for an Islamic terrorist or a racist skinhead hate killer you'd be a fool not to rely on things like distinctive physical appearance, clothes, language, tatoos, etc. Still, everyone knows that these items alone are only vague indicators and cannot be relied upon with an any degree of specificity, and a clever criminal can even use them against you.

What I am concerned about is the development of these common sense indicators as a "science" which gives it a legitimacy it simply does not possess. Profilers may be useful in an investigation in a consulting capacity, but they should not be allowed to use their alleged reputations to eliminate or single out suspects, or to guide the direction of an investigation. No police or investigative technique is of value in itself unless it turns up admissable evidence. This is why we have courts. Profilers, for example, have no place on the witness stand, any more than psychologists or psychics do. They are not experts, at the very best, they are people with lots of experience who have developed a good intuition. Their advice is potentially useful but by no means dependable.