I belong to the San Joaquin Chapter of Sisters in Crime which meets in Fresno. In fact, I am one of the founding members of this chapter.

Over the years we’ve had police officer, police detectives, the county coroner, private detectives, CSI folks, fire investigators, and of course lots and lots of authors. One of our favorite speakers though is Dr. Eric Hickey.

Here’s his bio:

ERIC W. HICKEY, Ph.D.
Criminologist–Consultant
Cell 559-676-0711
Office: 559-253-2226
Fax: 559-253-2267
http://forensics.alliant.edu
Dr. Eric W. Hickey

Dr. Hickey is the Director of the Center for Forensic Studies at Alliant International University. He also teaches criminal psychology at California State University, Fresno, CA. Dr. Hickey has taught many courses in criminal personalities, sex crimes, homicide and psychopathology in universities, colleges, jails and prisons and supervises theses and dissertations involving forensic and criminal psychology. Dr. Hickey has considerable field experience working with the criminally insane, psychopaths, sex offenders and other habitual criminals. He has also served as an adjunct instructor for the American Prosecutor’s Research Institute at the National Advocacy Center in Columbia, South Carolina profiling stalkers, cyber-stalkers, criminal personalities and sexual predators.

He publishes books, articles and lectures extensively on the etiology of violence and serial crime. His book, Serial Murderers and Their Victims, 4th ed., Thomson/Wadsworth Publishers, is used as a teaching tool in universities and by law enforcement in studying the nature of violence, criminal personalities and victim-offender relationships. Another of his books, The Encyclopedia of Murder and Violent Crime, Sage Publishers, explores the phenomenon of murder and violence through the eyes of some of the world’s most noted experts. In 2006 he published Sex Crimes and Paraphilia (Prentice-Hall Publishers), a comprehensive examination of sexual perversions, sex offending and sexual predators. His latest coauthored book, The Myth of a Psychiatric Crime Wave, (Carolina Academic Press) examines the misperceptions and reality of the mentally ill and mentally disordered as criminals. He is currently writing another text examining criminal minds and criminal personalities. He is also writing his first novel, In Sane, a disturbing journey into the minds of psychotics, psychopaths and the criminally insane. Dr. Hickey is co-founder of Gambaru Productions and is developing a new television series, Predators, to assist crime survivors (See predators.tv).

His expertise is regularly sought by the media including appearances on CNN, Catherine Crier Live, NPR, Larry King Live, 20/20, A&E Biography, Good Morning America, Court TV, Discovery and TLC. He consults with private agencies and testifies as an expert witness in both criminal and civil cases. A former consultant to the FBI’s UNABOM Task Force, Dr. Hickey currently assists local, state, and federal law enforcement in training and investigations. This includes assisting Peace Officer Service Training (POST) in developing course material and job aids for investigators. He also conducts seminars for agencies involving the profiling and investigating of sex crimes, arson, robbery, homicide, stalking, workplace violence and terrorism as well as workshops for mental health practitioners. Internationally recognized for his research on multiple homicide offenders, Dr. Hickey has conducted seminars in several countries including Canada, England, France, and Japan. He has also trained VIP protection specialists in Israel in profiling stalkers. His research involving hundreds of victims of stalking examines the psychology and classification of stalkers, victim-offender relationships, intervention, and threat assessment.

He’s spoken to us about nearly all of the above topics and this time he focused on serial killers complete with photos and in some cases the killer and photos of their victims (when they were alive in most cases.)

He’s absolutely fascinating and such a gentle man, it’s hard to believe that he dwells on such sordid subjects and teaches about them. I was so glad I got to hear him speak again.

Getting there was an adventure in itself. I knew how to get to the college where he was speaking, but the woman who rode with me said she knew a better way–so I followed her directions. As we got farther and farther into Fresno I began to recognize neighborhoods that were in the opposite direction from where we should be driving. I pulled over and whipped out my handy Magellan, programmed it for the address of our destination. It took us to a quicker way to get to where we needed to be–we’d gone about 9 miles the wrong direction. Sure glad my own inner Magellan was alerting me that we were not on the right track.

It was all worth it, Dr. Hickey is a fascinating speaker.

Marilyn