Part of the reason of David's insanity could have been the fact that he was adopted as a child. Growing up he always made it a point to try and find his father, and when he finally did, he deemed himself the Son of Sam. David lived a very troubled childhood in his head. It was said that his foster parents loved and adored him, but David felt rejected and neglected because he felt that his birth mother did not want him. Another mistake his adopted parents made, was telling him that his birth mother died giving birth to him. Later on in his life, David found out that his birth mother was alive and died when he was 18 years old. Befpre she died, David attempted to make contact with her again and start over, but she wanted nothing to do with him, simply heightening his feeling of rejection and abandonment. The sense of abandonment and being lied to his whole life could have been the spark that he needed to lead such a terrible life. After high school, Berkowitz joined the Army, and when he came back, the murders began.
The profile that police and psychologists had on him simply grew more and more as the killings came about. The randomness led them to believe that he was a psycho and just wanted to inflict pain upon people because perhaps that was the way he felt. Due to eye witness reports of seeing him with the gun and the stances he took, they knew that he was familiar and somewhat smart with weapons and how to use them, indicitative of possible police or army experience. This profile was prominant maybe with a few details going back and forth until he began to write the letters. David was a satanist and made sure to let people know in his letters. The items in these letters were random and horrible, some saying that he was trapped and that he was going to kill more. This was a key in creating a more in depth psychologic profile of the suspect. In 1977, experts finally had a complete profile. In the letters they were able to find out that it was David against the city, and he was not just writing to the captain of the police, but the whole taskforce. The profile was this: they were looking for a paranoid schizophrenic who was more than likely possesed by a demon or entity in his own head. The killer was most certainly a loner who probably had trouble communicating with women and getting into relationships, due to his problems with his mother at a young age. This profile was successful when it reached the public in narrowing down the possibilites, for people that knew of David Berkowitz, knew it was him.
The profile that police and psychologists had on him simply grew more and more as the killings came about. The randomness led them to believe that he was a psycho and just wanted to inflict pain upon people because perhaps that was the way he felt. Due to eye witness reports of seeing him with the gun and the stances he took, they knew that he was familiar and somewhat smart with weapons and how to use them, indicitative of possible police or army experience. This profile was prominant maybe with a few details going back and forth until he began to write the letters. David was a satanist and made sure to let people know in his letters. The items in these letters were random and horrible, some saying that he was trapped and that he was going to kill more. This was a key in creating a more in depth psychologic profile of the suspect. In 1977, experts finally had a complete profile. In the letters they were able to find out that it was David against the city, and he was not just writing to the captain of the police, but the whole taskforce. The profile was this: they were looking for a paranoid schizophrenic who was more than likely possesed by a demon or entity in his own head. The killer was most certainly a loner who probably had trouble communicating with women and getting into relationships, due to his problems with his mother at a young age. This profile was successful when it reached the public in narrowing down the possibilites, for people that knew of David Berkowitz, knew it was him.