Micki Pistorius

Micki Pistorius is a South African forensic or investigative psychologist and author.

She was the first woman in her profession and the first profiler in South Africa, working on many high-profile cases involving serial killers for the South African Police Service in the 1990s.

Pistorius joined the South African Police Service (SAPS) in 1994, where she founded and headed the Investigative Psychology Unit as chief investigative psychologist.

Within two years of this appointment, she completed her D.Phil, with her thesis: "A psycho-analytical approach to serial killers".

While writing her thesis on serial killers, the first in South Africa, she developed her theory linking Freudian psychosexual development with serial killing.

She also compiled curricula investigative psychology courses.

By 1997, she had trained over 100 detectives to investigate serial criminals, and two successors, including Elmarie Myburgh.

She said later that she was accepted by the detectives and worked very well with them, and the training developed by her was extended internationally.

Pistorius was involved in more than thirty serial killer cases while at SAPS.

Among the killers whose cases she worked on are Norman Afzal Simons, Moses Sithole, David Selepe, Stewart Wilken, Sipho Thwala, Velaphi Ndlangamandla, Cedric Maake, David Mmbengwa, and Christopher Mhlengwa Zikode.

She is known for her autobiography, Catch Me a Killer (2000), on which a television series of the same name was based, released in 2024.

Pistorius grew up in Pretoria.

She studied German in school, and graduated with a BA,, majoring in psychology and languages at the University of Pretoria.

She studied French at university.

After graduating with a BA, Pistorius began working in public relations, which included writing press releases, before moving into journalism.

Starting at a local newspaper, she moved on to working as a radio news journalist at the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) in Pretoria, which also involved some work in television.

After moving to Cape Town, she wrote for a women's magazine, before being appointed to a managerial position in publications at the World Wide Fund for Nature in Stellenbosch.

After leaving that job, she moved back to Pretoria and worked in public relations at Pretoria Zoo.

Pistorius then applied for and was accepted into the psychology honours and master's programmes at the University of Pretoria, acquiring both degrees cum laude.

She started lecturing in psychology, earning a reputation for eccentricity.

In 2000, she resigned from the police with the rank equivalent to senior superintendent, and joined a private investigation company.

She sought counselling when she realised that she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

A UK publisher invited her to write an autobiography, which became her international bestselling book Catch Me a Killer (2000), after Penguin South Africa bought the manuscript and published it.

While working for the private firm, Pistorius wrote Strangers in the Street: Historical overview of SA serial killers (2002) again published by Penguin SA, which then commissioned her to write Fatal Females (2004), which described the crimes of 51 female perpetrators.

In the same year, she published an historical novel, Sorg.

Profiling serial killers and other crimes followed in 2005.

The Afrikaans translation of Catch Me a Killer, Skimme in die Skadu'', was published in 2006.

Pistorius then joined the TV production company Zyron (owned by actress Sandra Prinsloo and producer Jan Groenewalt), and wrote scripts and co-presented two crime documentary series.

She also featured in a number of local and international crime documentaries, including by the SABC, M-Net, KykNET, BBC, and others.

Canal Plus in France aired a documentary Micki et le vent noir (Micki and the Black Wind) about her career as a profiler, and several international magazines, including Paris Match, featured articles about her.

An 11-part true crime television series, called Catch Me a Killer and based on her autobiography of the same name, was released by Showmax in early 2024.

Lead writer on the series was Amy Jephta, and Charlotte Hope stars as Pistorius.

The series was co-produced by the German production company Night Train Media, Pistorius was a consultant on the series, and also provided emotional support to Hope during filming.

along with CMak (UK) and M-Net (SA).

The series is directed by Tracey Larcombe.

Pistorius opened a private practice as psychologist and consultant and wrote a few in-house pieces, before making another turn in her career.

In 2010 she enrolled for an honours degree in Biblical archaeology.

She completed the degree within a year after researching and submitting 15 articles.

Also in 2010, she gave expert advice as a clinical psychologist in a court case involving a woman who had committed sexual abuse on children under the influence of her controlling lover.

she was still consulting for South African government agencies.