Who Is The Craigslist Suspect?

A Criminal Profiler And Former Classmate Describe The Perpetrator And The Med Student

(CBS)  Police in Boston have charged a clean-cut, 22-year-old medical student who is engaged to be married with murder and armed robbery, just months before he was due to walk down the aisle.

Philip Markoff will be arraigned later today on charges of murder, kidnapping and armed robbery, in connection with the death of one young woman and the robbery of another at two Boston luxury hotels. Both women had advertised massage services on Craigslist, the classified ad Web site.

Markoff's fiancee said police have the wrong man and there is no way he could have done it.

In an e-mail to ABC's "Good Morning America, Megan McAllister said Markoff "could not hurt a fly."

She called him "a beautiful person inside and out," according to the message read on the air Tuesday.

McAllister said she and Markoff expect to be married in August "and share a wonderful, meaningful life together."

Markoff has no criminal record, but police are confident they've got their man - and they believe he may have other victims as well. One may be a woman who was tied up and robbed at a Holiday Inn in Warwick, R.I., last week, before the woman's husband arrived and her assailant fled.

Adjectives used by friends and acquaintances to describe Markoff have ranged from "likable" and "fun to be around" and "totally normal," to "creepy" or "weird."

A native of Upstate New York, Markoff graduated from SUNY Albany in 2007 and was attending Boston University's medical school when he was arrested in connection with the murder of 26-year-old Julissa Brisman, who was found dead April last Monday at the Boston Marriott Copley Place.

Joe Coe, a former classmate of Markoff's at SUNY Albany, told Early Show anchor Harry Smith that he remembered Markoff as "an average man, very unremarkable."

Coe said he knew Markoff fairly well. "He was really good friends with one of the men that I lived with, and he was over my apartment frequently."

When asked his general impression, Coe said, "There was nothing that really stood out to me as something special. He would say off-color comments about women, and opposed people, which would become an argument with me and some other people that lived in the apartment."

"Would you describe him as misogynistic?" Smith asked.

"I would say that he was so, as much as most men in our society are," said Coe (left). "So there [were] layers of it. But it wasn't anything that was, like, overt. Like, you wouldn't think of him being a card-carrying member of the KKK, but he was someone that had issues with people of color, had issues with women."

When he heard the news of Markoff's arrest as the Craigslist killer, Coe said he initially felt shock. "I wouldn't believe that someone that was in my apartment, that I've had dinner with, that I've spoken with, could be a perpetrator, allegedly, of these kinds of horrific acts against women."

Smith asked if any acquaintances had negative portraits of Markoff: "Did anybody you know, any girls that dated him, or people in your particular social group, ever say 'this guy's creepy'? Or 'this guy gave me a bad vibe?'"

"I heard that a lot," Coe said. "And I've been hearing that a lot since [the news] broke. And it's that misogyny and male entitlement [that] really comes out, and people are starting to talk about that."

Listening to comments about Markoff, criminal profiler Pat Brown (left) told Smith that the comments made about the alleged killer are just what she had expected.

"People ask me, 'Is there going to be anything about this guy that people are going to recognize? Is there going to be a history?' Absolutely, because you don't just turn this age, … a second-year medical student, and you suddenly decide you're going to go rob people and shoot women," Brown said. "So there had to be a psychopathy running for a long time, and had to be behaviors that would, once you look back, you'll say, 'Wait a minute, he does have some peculiar things about him from, as you said, creepy things about him,' that have basically been ignored or minimized."

Smith wondered about a medical student - intelligent, who is familiar with technology, leaving a trail of clues. [Computer experts were apparently able to help police track Markoff's movements via his Blackberry use.]

"You have got to wonder about his intelligence, don't you?" Brown said.

She suggested that it reveals a particular psychological trait: "I think the real problem is he just feels omnipotent. He just feels like he's not going to be caught. He thinks he's so smart he doesn't pay attention. He thinks he can get away with everything. And probably he's been able to get away with an awful lot in his life, either through his family or through his school. Something has given him so much entitlement that he simply thinks he walks on water. And he's now found out, of course, that he does not."

Brown also reflected on Markoff's wedding, scheduled for August, which was being publicly celebrated on a Web page.

"He's obviously able to get through life doing the things that normal people do," she said. "But he's got this side of him that people do not really realize was there. And one of the questions was, why did he commit these crimes? [And] were they just robberies?"

[alltherightmoves]

The two interviews that CBS Early Show Host Harry Smith did were pretty lame. Joe Coe gets his two minutes of fame. Here's my take on this interview-not credible. Somehow I get the feeling that he is looking for two minutes of fame and offering opinions on the situation without really knowing this guy (Markoff). For CBS to just put any acquaintance on the air (Coe was obviously someone who did not know Markoff well), puzzles me. Couldn't CBS find someone who knew him better. Coe threw out opinions-without proof such as Markoff didn't like people of off color and women??? Lastly, I wonder if Criminal Profiler Pat Brown will add later when she has more info on Markoff, that this guy was an addicted gambler and that he was just flat out desperate for money. Perhaps, a robbery went bad and he ended up shooting victim; or he killed to eliminate direct witness. We will soon find out as the case proceeds. CBS-please interview more credible witnesses than Joe Coe.

[Slrman]

"they've got their man" CBS, learn some English. It's "they HAVE their man" what you have said is "that have got their man". Well, I doubt if the illiterates you have writing your stories know why that is wrong, too.

There are so many grammatical errors in the CBS site that it is becoming disgusting to read. There was a time when the news media were the guardians and even the arbiters of the language. Now they are the muggers of English. But they have no shame or even regard for their readers.

[Mktupee]

This Joe Coe character seems as though he is some psych major trying to get his 15min of fame going on CNN and the early show repeatedly stated "the men in our society"...saying phil was sexiest is a crock...he obviously has no idea who he is Also phil wasn't an upperclass white male as the news depicts him he was middle class upstate ny law abiddening citizen who led a double life that no one that knew him ever picked up on...

[michigal1]

She called him "a beautiful person inside and out," according to the message read on the air Tuesday.

McAllister said she and Markoff expect to be married in August "and share a wonderful, meaningful life together."
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She apparently didn't check his blackberry or his whereabouts very much. There had to have been something, anything that may have raised a few red flags, even minor ones. She's most likely so excited about the wedding that any flaws he may have had were overlooked. I feel for her though, she must be devastated to know that someone she was so close to and thought she knew turned out to be the devil.

[nursect]

Yes, Craigslist is a place that can be extremely useful and it's unfortunate that it has been turned into nothing but scams really. And who is this "Joe" person that is the "friend of a friend"? Does he even know this guy? Does he have any traning to be able to say what he's saying about the alleged killed?

[Ceres6]

I don't know who is that lady, Megan McAllister, but simple common sense is not to trust those people that "could not hurt a fly." I have learned about some people that appeared to be like saints, who were only missing the rings over their heads, that could not hurt a mosquito, however, they turned out to be worse than chupacabras.

[Ceres6]

Is is sad to see that a useful tool as Craigstool is used by many kinds of predators around the world to try to hurt and rip off innocent people. Something as simple as offering math and science tutoring services, will give crooks the opportunity of trying to blackmail you in several ways. If you receive any check from them and deposit the check in your bank account, you are dead meat. The crooks will wipe out every penny in your savings and checking accounts. In addition, always they will write a check for a larger amount, making you responsible at your bank for every cent defrauded.

[mja721]

craigslist is nasty. nothng but scams and sex- and now death

[TheMasses01]

Who Is The Craigslist Suspect?
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Is it you?