Be Your Own Private Eye

Private investigators can have a difficult time doing their jobs. They have to be on their guard all the time so that they do not appear to be snooping or investigating, all in order to ensure that they are seeing the true state of things, and not something that is being acted out. They have to gain access to databases and look for information that may range from something as simple as a person’s phone number, to the entire background history of a witness in an important criminal case. They also need to operate within civil laws and take care that they do not violate any laws in the process of their investigating.

One such law is extortion. Extortion is a situation wherein a person threatens someone else in order to get something, usually a sum of money. The law itself covers all individuals, but private investigators can often fall into the extortion trap whenever they reach a point of desperation. For instance, a private investigator may interview witnesses, and then throw in the threat of taking a case to court if the witness does not sign a confession in the wording that the private investigator wants. Or, a private investigator may demand a certain amount of money from a person being tailed or investigated if the said person would like the investigation to stop.

There are many such documented cases wherein private investigators have indeed been charged with extortion. In one such case, a private investigator threatened to take a case to court unless one party wrote a statement of confession, and unless that party paid the private investigator money. In another documented case, a private investigator left indecent pictures of a person with that specific person, along with a note that threatened to show more indecent pictures in compromising places, and at the wrong times, unless that person would pay up his or her debts. By making such threats, these private investigators would not only have been charged with extortion, but would also have their licenses as private investigators revoked.

These are only a few aspects of extortion as they relate to the activities of private investigators. If you are a private investigator, you should not only be knowledgeable about these laws, but you should also be aware of the limits of your investigative activities: how far should you go when talking to clients, and what are the boundaries of your work as an investigator? These are only a few questions you should ask yourself as you continuously hone your skills and work toward being a better private investigator.

Despite the Internet, search engines, and various ways to know the nitty-gritty of every person’s private life, many people still need private investigators in order to find out about certain facts that they may need to support a case. Private investigators still command large fees because there are many important databases, such as those that store numbers and names, that cannot be accessed by anyone, and that require fees and licenses to search through and handle. Lastly, despite the need to have more information and many more tools at our disposal, we must admit that we are often too busy, so we may need the services of a private investigator in order to work things out.

You can meet this need by starting a private investigation firm. Having a private investigation firm, however, will require you to have clout and permission from various sectors. This means that you will need to secure insurance for your employees, as well as licenses for your private investigators. Moreover, you will need to determine exactly what your private investigators will specialize in. Are they going to serve as back ups for defense teams in crime trials? Will they work for insurance companies in investigating liability claims? Will they follow cheating spouses around? There are many different roles that a private investigator may have to take on, so if you are interested in some of these, or possibly, in all of these roles, you will also need to check what training you will require your employees to have.

The special roles of your employees as private investigators may also require you to look for companies that will need your services later. This is where your clout should come in. Start networking by looking for insurance companies who may need liability claims investigated, and start talking to them about hiring people from your staff. Start networking with trial lawyers in your area about hiring private investigators to do background checks and witness interviews for them. Start advertising in your local newspaper or telephone directory about your services as private investigator. You need people to know that you are there to help them, so list your services and provide contact information.

You will also need to hire private investigators, so you can either recruit freelance private investigators, or go to private investigator training schools or centers in order to recruit the potential members of your staff. These are only a few tips that you may want to follow as you start off with your private investigation firm. For more information, talk to your local better business bureau, or consult with private investigators in your area.

Private investigators lead dangerous lives, and especially when they have to work with attorneys in order to ensure that a case is carried out successfully. That is, if they are working with the prosecutors, they may need to investigate the witnesses to the defense; and if they are working with the defense, they may need to investigate witnesses to the prosecution. It is the latter case that private investigators are needed to join the defense team in finding witnesses who may not have presented themselves, or in looking for evidence that might have been missed or are being hidden. A defense attorney will always assume that his or her client is innocent, and in order to do this, a defense attorney can look for the services of a private investigator.

A private investigator will sometimes be given the task of looking for witnesses, as well as evidence that the defendant is not the one who committed the crime. The private investigator will need to understand what laws are entailed by the trial and aspects of the crime, and once the private investigator understands the case, he or she can then go through the materials given by the prosecuting team to the defense team. These materials may include police reports, statements of witnesses, photographs of the crime scene, and other evidence pertaining to the case. It is the job of the private investigator to see if there are inconsistencies in witness testimonies, or in any conclusions that the prosecution team may draw from the evidence that they have presented.

When interviewing witnesses, a private investigator will have to think of a before and after: he or she has to look at witness testimonies, and take note of various points that are important to the case; and he or she has to look at the nature of each question asked. When the private investigator finally meets with the witness, he or she can ask the questions again, and then compare the answers to the once given previously. Moreover, the private investigator can ask questions that might bring to light the important points of the case that he or she noted from the witness testimonies; are these important points corroborated by new questions, or are they changed? Slight changes can make or break a case, so private investigators need to be thorough in talking to witnesses again.

In addition to these, a private investigator will also do background checks on witnesses. These checks will help them locate witnesses better. These are only a few aspects of how private investigators interview or talk to witnesses, and the details of the interviews will usually depend on the nature of the case in question.

Private investigation is not a job that can be envied. Private investigators have a lot of work to do: they need to interview the people who hired them in order to find out exactly what these people need to find out; they need to follow people around and keep a very low profile; and they need to have access to databases and be able to search through these databases of names, numbers, addresses, and personal information patiently. It is for this reason that many private investigators command large fees for their work, but it is also for this reason that many private detectives can slacken their pace eventually.

Not all private detectives, however, slacken their pace and eventually get out of the slacker trap. Some will stay in it and still command large fees for their work. If you think that your private investigator is becoming a slacker, then you will have to replace this private investigator with someone who can do good work for you and give you the best value for your money. So how do you know that your private investigator is slacking off?

The tell-tale signs may come when your private investigator hands you data or information that is either repeated or useless to you. More importantly, when your private investigator starts handing you information less frequently than either he or she has promised, or than what you have been used to, then you may start thinking about replacing your private investigator. True, not all investigations require a lot of information to be handed over, but if you need a lot of information regularly (such as when your private investigator is trailing someone that you need information on), then you will need regular updates.

When you start looking for a private investigator, you will need to have a contract, which you and your private investigator need to sign in order to agree on the terms of the investigation. If your private investigator is starting to renege on the terms of the contract or is negotiating terms in the middle of the agreed time for private investigation, then your private investigator may be looking for excuses to work slowly and be a slacker. Moreover, when you start confronting your private investigator about his or her slower pace, he or she should either apologize or promise to go faster than before – but if he or she starts making excuses and starts justifying his or her behavior, then beware. A private investigator who is being defensive instead of productive may not be up for the job.

Fraud is a growing problem in many organizations, costing companies millions of dollars in lost revenues and stolen resources.  Criminals are also increasingly becoming more sophisticated, capable of infiltrating companies as ordinary employees and then stealing from their employers in different ways.  One of these ways is through the filing of false worker’s compensation reports.  If companies are not careful, they could stand to lose a lot of money if the report is not assessed and checked for veracity.  To prevent this from happening, it’s often best to leave the work of verifying the correctness of the complaint to the professionals.  Here’s how to hire a worker’s compensation investigator to help you:

Ask if he is licensed.
Your state will probably not allow a worker’s compensation private investigator to work if he is not licensed to operate in that area.  Check if your P.I. is licensed to ensure that his training and certification are regulated by the appropriate agencies.  This will also assure you that you will be dealing with a professional. 

A license is also required if you need to build a case, as you would if you have to work with a worker’s compensation investigator.  Any information that an unlicensed investigator will obtain will be of no value legally.  To protect yourself and make sure that your money and efforts don’t go to waste, work only with a licensed P.I.

It’s also a good idea to check whether your P.I. is a member in any trade organization.  Being affiliated means he is up-to-date about the latest news and information about federal and state statutes in the industry.  If he is, he will be able to work within the boundaries of the law and ensure that whatever results he will produce are legal and useful.

Find someone who has a good knowledge of federal and state laws.
There are slight differences in laws and regulations covering worker’s compensation, so you might want to hire a worker’s compensation investigator who has the background and understanding of legal requirements and guidelines. 

Ask if he is insured.
Ironically, you’ll have to hire a worker’s compensation investigator who carries sufficient liability insurance.  This will keep you from spending for personal injuries and damages in case he meets an accident on the job.  Insurance coverage might not be such a concern, however, if your P.I. will be working in a case with little exposure or if he has to be unarmed.  If he will be carrying a firearm as required by the case, then ask for insurance coverage.

Hire someone with good communications skills.
The ability to communicate effectively through oral and written interviews and reports is an excellent asset for a worker’s compensation investigator.  He or she is bound to talk to you and other people pertaining your case.  If he cannot communicate well, there might be problems ascertaining certain minute details of your case.  These minute details might just cost you later, so it’s best to stick to someone who can talk and write well.

Discuss his professional rate.
Do not sign an agreement with a worker’s compensation investigator without first discussing his rates.  Although most PIs will charge you for every hour that they work, worker’s compensation and insurance claims investigator usually prefer a flat rate.  Rates vary, depending on the investigator’s experience, qualifications and the type of work that needs to be done. 

Put everything in writing.
Make sure you have a written agreement when you hire a worker’s compensation investigator.  Whatever you have discussed and agreed upon during your interviews should be included in the contract.  This will include what the P.I. is supposed to do, how much his rates will be and the maximum amount of expenses you will allow, among other things.  And when the assignment is done, always ask for a detailed written report for documentation.

The telephone is something that we can’t live without in our busy world, but it has also been something that has spawned quarrels as much as it has brought life and strength to friendships. For instance, you may be looking for an old friend, and all you have is a phone number that might have long been disconnected; being able to call that old friend, say, for networking, or simply hooking up and catching up after a long while, will require that you get the services of someone who can get you in contact with that friend again.

You might also be worried that you are being overcharged by your cellular phone company for calls that you did not make. You may see many different numbers on your cellular phone bill, and it can be tedious to track down all the numbers and look for a common person that all these people know. You will need someone to trace the calls to the hijacking number, which can probably lead to the apprehension of the person stealing your cellular phone minutes from you.

You might also be receiving threatening phone calls or prank calls, and you might have a hard time using your caller ID – or you simply may not have caller ID, and are tired of receiving such calls. In all these cases, you will need a private investigator acting and working as a reverse phone detective. A reverse phone detective will have the license to search through phone number databases and be able to track the numbers that you may need for your investigative problem. All you need to do is to talk to the reverse phone detective about the problem that you are experiencing, which will give the reverse phone detective information about what numbers should be traced, and where they can be found.

You will pay a reverse phone detective quite a large amount, and for three different reasons. First, their expertise fee requires payment, as they know where to go for the information that you are looking for; second, you need to cover the access to the phone number databases, which requires a fee; and third, you will need to cover the time that the reverse phone detective used to work on your case. If you are prepared to pay a fee, then hiring a private investigator as a reverse phone detective might be the solution to your telephone-related woes.

Many private investigators may be tasked to trace telephone calls, conduct stakeouts on spouses who might be cheating, or follow suspicious persons around on behalf of the needs of a company, business, or private citizen. However, did you know that private investigators can also be hired by insurance companies to investigate insurance claims? There are many people who will often make insurance claims in order to be paid money that they do not deserve. For instance, they can feign or deliberately inflict injury on themselves, or they can list deliberate acts as accidents, and thus run away with the money. Some people may even keep certain illnesses a secret, so that when they apply for insurance, they will be readily accepted without question or exceptions. Therefore, they can collect money later when they receive treatment for their illness.

There are several insurance firms that look for insurance liability private investigators regularly in order to investigate claims, and there are therefore companies built around honing the skills of such investigators. Such companies act as a sort of pool of investigators, so if your insurance company needs such investigators, or if your company is seeking to investigate the health claims of its employees, then you can look for these private investigation companies online.

When searching for such companies, check that they are licensed to operate as private investigators. Look, moreover, for proof of their expertise by checking their track record. Because many private investigation companies will not disclose the names of their corporate clients, you can also talk to other insurance companies or consult with colleagues on who they hire to do insurance liability investigation. Look for private investigators who can do injury surveillance on existing employees, or who can do surveillance on employees who claim to be resting after being injured.

Some private investigators can also do background checks on applicants in order to check if they deserve insurance benefits. There are also private investigators that track down people who claim to be dead, or who claim to have been injured irreparably. Some people even kill to collect insurance, and in this case, private investigators can help the police crack the case.

When looking for private investigation companies, have as many different candidates that you can choose from in terms of expertise and track record. When choosing the private investigation company, look for one that offers the best services for the most reasonable price. Not all private investigators are honest, so you need to be prudent when choosing one to help you and your company out.

If you have been receiving threats, or if you need to trace those strange phone calls that you keep on receiving at home, or if you think that your spouse may be cheating on you, or if you simply need to set your mind at ease about an issue, you may be thinking about hiring a private investigator.

A private investigator can do phone tracing, lead to the apprehension of anyone who is threatening you, tell you the truth (however painful) about your spouse, and settle any issues that you might have that might need a private investigator to resolve. However, not all private investigators are as angelic as you might think them to be; in fact, you may need to do some investigation on your investigator in order to know if your investigator is a scam artist instead of a helping hand.

First, check if your private investigator has a license. Most U.S. states require that private investigators be licensed before they do any private investigations. Your private investigator should show you a copy of his or her official license. You may also be tempted to solicit the services of “private investigation” firms online, which may not have private investigator licenses. These firms simply do background checking by going through directories and public records for you, but if you want complete information that is accurate, you may need to hire a private investigator.

You do not need to do a big background check on your private investigator, although you could ask about him or her through your better business bureau, just in case he or she has been involved in a scam before. On a less devious front, when talking to the private investigator, have a contract ready. This contract should indicate completely why you are hiring the private investigator, what they are expected to do, what information you expect to get out of them, and how much they will be paid for their efforts. A contract ensures that all expectations are met, and that both parties, that is, you and the private investigator, get what you want. If a private investigator does not want to work on a contract with you, then that attitude is more powerful than any background check: simply go and look for another investigator.

Ask your private investigator for a resume that details his or her background in investigation. Once you have a copy of this resume, cross check on a few random details. For instance, some private investigators may have been policemen before, or may have served in the military, and can thus use their experience in carrying out private investigation. Check the veracity of these credentials and you can check the integrity of the private investigator that you may be working with.

No matter how well loved a company is, and no matter how many people with strength and integrity sit on its board of directors, there will always be detractors and dissenters who will want to bring the company down, for one reason or another. For instance, disgruntled former employees who might have been fired for negligence may threaten to sue the company if the employees were not given their last month’s pay; or interest groups might threaten the company with arson if they feel, sometimes too passionately, that the company’s labor policies are unfair, or if they feel that the company’s research and development practices are detrimental to the environment.

In order to ferret out the perpetrators of such trouble, some companies will choose to hire a private investigator. What exactly would the role of a private investigator be in this context? A private investigator can develop a set of practices, as well as protocols, that the company can use to assess threats to the assets of the company (such as those involved in paying for litigation during lawsuits, or in sending out calming marketing messages when the mud slinging has started). In some companies, a private investigator will speak only to the top level management and will deliver intelligence information that has been collected through conversations with workers or field investigation.

In some cases, companies may also call on a private investigator to do auditing work, as well as to conduct research on how employees are behaving in the company, and how efficiently they are working. The investigation may allow top level management to see deficiencies in their businesses processes, and know which employees are not working or behaving in a manner appropriate to the business setting. Lastly, a private investigator should have strong ties with law enforcement agencies, as well as intelligence services, in order to aid the company when employees have to be apprehended, or when suspects in outside company threats have been identified.

These are only a few traits that are unique to private investigators who investigate company threats. The private investigator may be hired freelance, or may be employed by the company as an undercover employee, or any kind of worker in the company location such that the private investigator will pass unnoticed through the vicinity of work. A private investigator may also be required to do field work when investigating leads on people who are threatening the company. In all these cases, businesses and companies may need private investigators in order to fix their company and ensure its security and success.

There is so much romance in the concept and act of extracting fingerprints to solve crimes, thanks in part to the continuing popularity of crime shows on TV.  Fingerprint extraction is such an exacting science that it requires patience and a very meticulous system of collection in order to ensure that the sample collected is reliable.  For private investigation students, fingerprint extraction is one of the basic skills they will have to learn.

The purpose of fingerprint extraction
The ancient Chinese and Assyrians used fingerprints to establish identity when signing legal documents.  However, its use as a classification system started in 1823 and again in the late 19th century.  It was in the late 1800s when British police used fingerprints for the identification of criminals in Bengal, India.  Some 10 years later, the first fingerprint files in Britain was established.  From then on, the science of fingerprint extraction has progressed, becoming a very effective method of identification and a highly efficient tool for crime fighting.

Methods of collecting fingerprints

Fingerprint extraction by powder dusting
To collect fingerprints, one of the oldest methods used is by powder dusting the surface.  A forensic or crime scene technician will use very fine powder to dust an area.  This powder is spread with the use of a rounded brush or a magnetic wand.  If there are fingerprints on the surface, this powder will stick to the proteins that have been secreted by the fingers’ sweat glands.  The technician will then remove the excess powder to reveal any impressions that may have been left behind. 

In most cases, dark fine powder is used to dust for fingerprints prior to extraction.  However, there are cases when fingerprints are especially difficult to find, much less obtain.  On certain surfaces, such as Formica, crime scene technicians might use fluorescent powder – the very fine type – to dust the area.  In the dark, this powder will glow, allowing technicians to locate where the prints are and lift them from the surface using sticky tape.

Fingerprint extraction by fuming
The fuming method, or more completely the cyanoacrylate fuming method is one of the best tools ever developed for fingerprint extraction.  This is the preferred method when dealing with latent fingerprints.  It produces high quality results, which makes it one of the most trusted methods used by forensic and crime scene investigators.

The fuming method is a chemical technique for extraction of prints.  Since fingerprints are made up of sweat (which later evaporates) and other components, including inorganic chemicals and proteins such as sodium, chlorine , potassium, glucose, peptides, amino acids, ammonia, isoagglutinogens and riboflavin, the fuming method uses a special chemical that will react to these substances.  By changing the chemical composition of these substances, the prints become visible and can later be photographed for identification or comparison.

To extract fingerprints using this method, a crime scene technician takes the surface to be processed and puts it inside a tank that contains a built-in heater.  This tank is airtight.  The technician will then put several drops of cyanoacrylate on a container located at the bottom part of the tank, seal the tank and then turn on the heater until it reaches about 120F to 150F.  The gaseous form of cyanoacrylate will then react with the surface to show any fingerprints, if there are any.

The fuming method is actually not new.  It has been used in the Criminal Identification Division in Japan since 1978.  It was later imported from Asia by the United States Army Criminal Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Laboratories.  Today, it is one of the most popularly used methods for fingerprint extraction used by professionals and is also highly recommended as a tool for private investigator students.