"The desire to find the fatal flaw is based on a widespread but false assumption that character is the only way to unlock the secrets of a killer. Either the person is depraved, which explains everything, or the person acted completely "out of character" and it's all just a mystery, a case of someone going mad. There is no halfway house. We seem to have a deep faith that not only do people have a character which determines how they would act in different situations, but that we know what those characters are like."
Not quite the headline I would have chosen, but it is indeed
my piece in today's Independent
