About Dr. Hickey
Dr. Eric W. Hickey is a senior core faculty member in Walden University’s Forensic Psychology
doctoral program. His primary duties include serving on dissertation committees, mentoring
doctoral students, residency instruction, conducting webinars, and program development As the
former Dean of the California School of Forensic Studies at Alliant International University and
Professor Emeritus at California State University, Fresno, Dr. Hickey has taught many courses
involving the psychology of crime. Some of the topics explored include serial and mass murder,
criminal paraphilia, sexual predators, crime scene investigations, psychopathy, criminal
personalities, arson and fire-setting, threat assessment and risk management, school and
workplace violence prevention, and victimology. He has also taught seminars at several
universities and colleges, as well as for jail and prison staff trainings, and supervises theses and
dissertations involving current topics in forensic psychology.
Dr. Hickey has considerable field experience working with the criminally insane, psychopaths,
sex offenders and other habitual criminals. He consults with private agencies and testifies as an
expert witness in both criminal and civil cases involving sex crimes against children and adults,
criminal paraphilia, stalking, homicide, domestic violence, and serial crimes. A former consultant
to the FBI’s UNABOM Task Force, Dr. Hickey assists local, state, and federal law enforcement in
training and investigations as well as assisting in the review of cold case files. His seminars for
law enforcement, mental health practitioners, and attorneys focus on criminal profiling, offender
psychopathy, female criminality, sex crimes, homicide, and other forensically related topics. He
has worked with California’s Peace Officer Service Training (POST) in developing course
material and job aids for investigators. Dr. Hickey has provided Independent Contractor services
for Robson Forensics, Atrium Services, ForensisGroup, and Avante Behavioral Health. He is also
a DOD military contractor for the United States Army Special Victims Capabilities Division
(SVCD) at Ft. Leonard Wood, MO and a California DOJ contractor.
Dr. Hickey has been identified as one of the top 15 active forensic experts in the world. He has
conducted seminars in countries throughout Europe, Asia and North America and has trained VIP
protection specialists in Israel in profiling stalkers and conducting threat assessments and
interventions. He collaborates with international schools in Rome and Madrid to facilitate global
training for students interested in applied forensic psychology. His expertise is chronicled in
dozens of television documentaries including appearances on History, NPR, 20/20, A&E Bio,
Oxygen, Reelz, GMA, CBC, TruTV, Discovery, TLC, FOX, CNN, Hulu, BuzzFeed and
NewsNation.
Dr. Hickey is a member of the Society of Police and Criminal Psychology (SPCP) and past
Editor-in-Chief for their Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology (JPCP). He has also
published several books and articles on the etiology of violence and serial crime including a
collaborative study assessing psychopathy levels in American serial killers. His most frequently
cited book, Serial Murderers and Their Victims, 7 th ed., (Cengage), is used as a teaching tool in
universities and by law enforcement in studying the nature of violence, criminal personalities, and
victim-offender relationships. Much of his research focuses upon the development of his theory
relational paraphilic attachment (RPA) and sexual predators. Dr. Hickey is currently co-editing a
textbook Sex Crimes and Criminal Paraphilia 2025 building upon another of his co-edited books
Understanding Necrophilia: A Global Interdisciplinary Approach. 2017 (Cognella).
