Profiling and Victimology: A Conversation with Pioneer Dr. Ann Wolbert Burgess

In this episode of Wildcide, we sit down with one of the most influential figures in modern criminal profiling — Dr. Ann Wolbert Burgess, the real-life inspiration behind Dr. Wendy Carr from Netflix’s Mindhunter.

Long before Mindhunter brought behavioral analysis into pop culture, Burgess was already inside the real FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit, decoding the minds of serial offenders and changing how investigators understood trauma, violence, and victim behavior.

From her pioneering research in victimology to her groundbreaking interviews that helped shape the FBI’s approach to behavioral profiling, Burgess reveals what it really takes to understand both predator and prey. She walks us through the psychology behind notorious cases — including her role in the Ski Mask Rapist investigation — and explains how empathy became one of the most powerful tools in criminal investigation.

This isn’t just a look into the mind of a killer — it’s a look into the mind of the woman who helped the world understand them.

 

About Dr. Burgess:

Ann Wolbert Burgess, D.N.Sc., APRN, FAAN, is an internationally recognized pioneer in the assessment and treatment of victims of trauma and abuse, and author of A Killer by Design: Murderers, Mindhunters, and My Quest to Decipher the Criminal Mind. She has received numerous honors including the Sigma Theta Tau International Audrey Hepburn Award, the American Nurses’ Association Hildegard Peplau Award, and the Sigma Theta Tau International Episteme Laureate Award. Her courtroom testimony has been described as “groundbreaking,” and she has been called a “nursing pathfinder.” Her research with victims began when she co-founded, with Boston College sociologist Lynda Lytle Holmstrom, one of the first hospital-based crisis counseling programs at Boston City Hospital. She then worked with FBI Academy special agents to study serial offenders, and the links between child abuse, juvenile delinquency, and subsequent perpetration. Her work with Boston College nursing colleague Carol Hartman led to the study of very young victims and the impact of trauma on their growth and development, their families and communities. Her work continues in the study of elder abuse in nursing homes, cyberstalking, and Internet sex crimes. She teaches courses in Victimology, Forensic Science, Forensic Mental Health, Case Studies in Forensics and Forensic Science Lab.

 

To purchase Dr. Burgess' newest book, click HERE.