A Different Kind of Loathsome Parasite

No, not some sort of intestinal worm or gonad-shrinking barnacle.  This is a really horrifying parasite:  a so-called "psychic detective" blundering into a criminal investigation to get publicity and thereby prey on more desperate, gullible people.  In some cases, the vicious organism can cause harm even after it's dead.

Joe Nickell (a real detective) has a pretty brutal demolition of a recent psychic fraud in Skeptical Inquirer, reprinted on the LiveScience Web site.  Listen to the the deafening silence of psychic boosters after they try to claim the "psychic's" sketch matches confessed killer John Mark Karr -- just before Karr's confession turned out to be bogus.