Russell Crane

"The killer's behavior doesn't make sense. Now if I had done this..."

- Russell Crane

Dr. Russell Crane is the Profiler of the Pacific Bay Police Department. He would unexpectedly find himself in a difficult situation after being flagged as a suspect in The End of the Night (Case #86, or Case #30 of Pacific Bay), but was eventually exonerated of all charges after his innocence was proven at the climax of the case.

Profile
As a criminal psychologist of 28 years of age, Russell has wavy medium blond hair and has green eyes. He is a man of medium size and build, and wears a black tie underneath a striped dark green shirt with black suspenders which go around his shoulders and connect to his brown leather belt. His shirt contains two pockets: the one on the left consists of a notepad as well as a blue pen, while the one on the right consists of a pair of dark brown glasses. Besides that, Russell wears a golden watch on his right hand and a pair of black pants, and can be often seen carrying his orange "Typical Profiles" book on his hand.

It is known that Russell's favourite animal is spider and that his favourite food is scones with Earl Grey tea. Russell is also known to be charming, obsessive and manipulative. Furthermore, Russell often carries the scent of blackberries, and loves riddles.

Dead Girl Rolling
Russell made his debut in the case, introducing a new gameplay mechanic, in which in the event objects and/or clues can't be identified by bio-forensics nor digital analysis, Russell can find new leads and/or new suspects through the lab talent of profiling.

Eastern Promises
As a criminal psychologist and holding a degree in criminal psychology, Russell has the responsibility of analyzing the health of the suspects if necessary, and if a suspect is found guilty of grand homicide, to submit a report of the killer's health before Judge Dante, as showcased in this case. Judge Dante will use Russell's report of the criminal's health to determine whether or not the killer will require treatment in a mental institution for the criminally insane.

Of Rats and Men
Russell had to tend for Amy Young when he found her wounded in the middle of the riot crisis (in which the the Pacific Bay police station was attacked by looters). Amy was severely beaten and Russell had to assist the team in catching Scott Lee Allan's killer since the station attack was linked to the murder. Russell did some lab work to help Frank Knight and the player incriminate the killer in this case, in which Amy had to participate in the lab task.

Hanging by a Thread
Russell played his first major role following the horrendous murder of cabaret dancer Dinah Cooper. After a threat from "The Puppeteer"--a notorious serial killer responsible for numerous murders over the past three decades, including the murders of Dinah and Yann Toussaint's parents--Chief Marquez was forced to pull Frank out of the case and replace him with Russell as the player's partner due to the case's nature. Russell played his part very well as he and the player used a combination of psychological and real-world clue gathering to incriminate the Puppeteer one by one, and thanks to Russell's psychological expertise, the Puppeteer was unearthed to be a certain Freddie Alonzo.

The End of the Night
Following the murder of urban legend hunter Roberto Vasquez, the team of Amy and the player found a fake eye on a melted snowman inside the ice cave where the Night Walker--a notorious "masked creature" and Roberto's slayer--resided in. The fake eye contained a message addressed to Roberto, from Dr. Crane, saying that the victim was wrong about something. Amy and the player thus went to Russell's office in order to talk to him about the fake eye on the double.

Russell thought Amy was compulsing, but the junior cop questioned Russell about his message to Roberto as if she was serious in demonstrating how the law is above everybody. Russell thus stated that he only followed Roberto's trend about the Night Walker and that he now felt guilty after Amy and the player caught him red-handed playing a grave prank on the urban legend hunter. Russell purchased the fake eye at the flea market, and using his hypnosis expertise, made Roberto believe that the eye belonged to a fallen war veteran, which Roberto fell for. Amy promised Russell that she would come back to him if he made any funny moves throughout the investigation.

In the midst of Amy's meltdown, Russell found himself in deeper trouble after the player found a prosthetic leg in which a message that the Night Walker could outlast Roberto was unraveled with forensic dusting. Since Russell was a suspect in this murder investigation, Amy had to inquire about this the hard way in the interrogation room.

Russell told Amy and the player he had nothing to do with the prosthetic leg and also made it clear that he did his own research on the Night Walker. Russell claimed that the killer who donned the Night Walker identity was intelligent and abstained to concede to the murder at all costs. The Night Walker would also do everything to negotiate in order to drop all homicide charges against them. While what Russell might've told Amy and the player weren't hard attributes of the Night Walker, they were psychological attributes which the Night Walker had--high intellect, persuasive, and hard to convince.

Russell was safe after the team sustained a pyrrhic victory in the case, exposing Amy's brother Duncan Young as the face behind the Night Walker's guise.

The Young and the Lifeless
Russell made a formal request to aid the player in investigating a disturbance in the Ivywood Theater to right the wrongs from the previous case, but made a false arrest after the player analyzed Abbi Absinthe's behavior when Russell incarcerated her. The player went to the theater once again with Frank and with the help of Yann's clinical expertise, Abbi was proven innocent after Reggie Perez was found guilty of a break-in at an Ivywood theater.

The player was upset about Russell's mistake and informed Chief Marquez about the trouble they had to put up with after the Chief told the player about Abbi's lawyers filing a complaint with the police. Moreso Chief Marquez informed the next time Russell make another mistake, she will suspend the psychologist with no questions asked.

Personal Life
Nothing is known about Russell's personal life apart from the fact that he hails from Ivywood Hills, as mentioned by himself during the events of The Young and the Lifeless.

Analyses
Object/Clue Profiling was introduced in Case #4 of Pacific Bay, and the feature was not available in Grimsborough. Russell's job is to analyze physical objects and/or clues that can't be analyzed flawlessly through neither bio-forensics nor digital analysis and return the results after a certain amount of time or a speed-up process using Criminal Case Cash. Russell's task wait rates will vary depending on the difficulty of the task, and all his tasks costs 1 Criminal Case Cash per 30 minutes.

Case #4: Dead Girl Rolling
 * Charm (03:00:00)
 * Cryptic Words on Ad (06:00:00)

Case #5: The Ice Queen
 * Receipt (15:00:00)

Case #6: Bayou Blood
 * Handwriting (06:00:00)
 * Voodoo Doll (09:00:00)

Case #13: Eastern Promises
 * Massage Positions (09:00:00)

Case #14: Spineless
 * Notebook (09:00:00)
 * Anarchist Manifesto (09:00:00)

Case #16: Killing Time
 * Recipient Number (09:00:00)

Case #19: Cloudy with a Chance of Murder
 * Poncho (03:00:00)
 * Puppeteer Article (06:00:00)

Case #20: Open Wounds
 * Routine Map (12:00:00)

Case #21: Under the Thunderdome
 * Photo Album (06:00:00)

Case #22: Of Rats and Men
 * Mask (12:00:00)

Case #27: Into the Woods
 * Drawing (09:00:00)
 * Night Walker Notes (06:00:00)

Case #28: The Hunger Planes
 * Flight Manifest (12:00:00)
 * Alice's Journal (06:00:00)
 * Picture (06:00:00)

Trivia

 * Russell's beta name was Jake Crane, but was changed to Russell Crane before the official release due to unknown reasons.
 * Russell's character strongly suggests that he was modeled after Spencer Reid, a fictional character from the CBS crime drama series Criminal Minds.
 * Russell, Howard Johnson, Carl Ackerman, Heather Valentine, Yann Toussaint are the only characters who appeared in at least one before appearing as a suspect in a further one.
 * Russell, Samuel King, and Yann Toussaint are the only main characters-to-date who were flagged as a suspect in a case.

Case Appearances
Russell makes his first appearance in Dead Girl Rolling, and as one of the main characters and the Profiler of the Pacific Bay PD, he appears in any Pacific Bay case in which a clue requires psychological analysis. There will be certain cases in which Russell won't have any lab jobs due to lack of psychological evidence to analyze, but at times, he will help out Yann or Roxie in some analyses whenever certain studies go beyond their experience. It should be noted that Russell replaces Frank as the player's partner during the third chapter of Hanging by a Thread, and that he is forced to be treated as a suspect in The End of the Night and as a result becomes ineligible to perform any psychological analysis.