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Janet Markham, studying for a master’s degreee in cosmology from the University of Wales, said that, when it comes to criminals, a study comparing both the year of birth and birthdate would yield more clues than sun sign comparisons alone.

“I don’t know how you would say that one sign is more aligned to criminality than another,” she said. “If you are looking at criminals, you might be better to look at their whole horoscope.”

Writing on Dailyhoroscope.com, for example, Jeff Jawer notes that serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, whose gruesome crimes included the murder and mutilation of at least 15 young men, was born on May 21, 1960, at 4:34 p.m. in Milwaukee. “He was a Gemini with the Sun in the 8th House of Sex and Death – two interests which were, unfortunately, closely linked in his life. His desires may have been twisted by potent Pluto’s 90-degree square to his Sun, an angle of tension and mistrust.”

Mass murderer Ted Bundy, was born on Nov. 24, 1946 at 10:35 p.m. in Burlington, Vermont, “with his Sun in fiery Sagittarius,” Mr. Jawer notes. “The key to his pathological behavior appears to be the conjunction of potentially violent Mars with his Moon and Lunar South Node, all in Sagittarius. Uranus, the planet of estrangement, was opposite these three, reflecting his unstable childhood and violent streak.”

Anne Massey, an astrologer in Surrey, B.C., has seen statistics suggesting that Cancers are most likely to be arrested, whereas the most law-abiding signs are Capricorn and Scorpio. She puts little stock in any of this, noting, “I really don’t think the sun sign has anything to do with it because astrology is far more complex than that.”

Dr. Anthony Doob, a professor of criminology at the University of Toronto, said, “I have no idea whether people born at particular times of the year are more likely to be arrested than anyone else. You would have to look at whether there is some consistency across time. My guess is that that, just from listening to the radio, there is not a whole lot going on anywhere, so someone produced this data.”

Const. Pearce, who produced the data, concedes, “Next year the list could be completely different unless we arrest the same people.”