Archive for category: General Investigations

We still get the periodic request from a prospective client for assistance in bugging a car or home with listening devices. Even as private investigators, we do not do this and we will not. It is illegal, yes even if you own the car, house, etc., and we cannot break the law, we suggest you don’t either. We also do not bring listening devices with us on surveillance. On TV the private investigator can often be seen aiming a parabolic listening device to try at the apartment window trying to hear a couple inside. This is very good TV and very bad detective work. This too is illegal. Sorry TV fans.

We had a situation where a new client engaged us to document where her husband was going with the idea being that he was seeing another woman. We followed him late into the evening and after he departed from a bar, he drove to a area frequented by prostitutes. He stopped and picked up a woman who we are certain is a prostitute and drove to an abandoned strip mall where he pulled into the rear alley. Obviously we could not follow him into the alley without being detected so we went to the other end of the alley and we were able to see the vehicle some 75-80 yards away. We could see people moving around inside the car but we could not actually see what was going on inside the car or make out their faces, largely due to a complete lack of lighting in the area. After 9-10 minutes, the vehicle started back up and they exited the alley. We filmed him returning this woman to the area where he picked her up, they talked through the car window for 30 seconds and then he was on his way home. The client indicated that the surveillance was poorly executed inasmuch as she cannot tell what they were doing inside the car in the alley. As much as we would liked to have documented that for her, the reality is that we had no real opportunity to do so. We are private investigators, not magicians. For those of you who have expectations set this high, we recommend that you interview several private detective agencies before hiring one so that you can get a true sense of the reality of the work product and the limitations that life imposes on us. As for our client, if it’s OK for your spouse to be parked in an alley with a hooker at 3:10 a.m. unless you see a sex act in progress, I think your marriage is in trouble video proof or not.

For those of you who are facing a possible infidelity at the workplace situtation, the company christmas party (the type where the spouse is not invited) is almost always a given time for the cheaters to get together. Lets face it, everyone drinks too much, people are in a good mood and they cheating spouse has a great opportunity to be away from you, to be drinking and to have an excuse about staying out late. Because most of the time the unfaithful spouse and co-worker do not want the affair to become public knowledge, they sneak out of the party seperately and go somewhere. In some cases, they don’t even make it to the party! We highly recommend having your private investigator watch them from mid-afternoon. If you truely have these doubts, this is an excelllent opportunity.

These days, almost everyone has a car and they drive themselves whenever they need to go some place. That includes driving to and from the place where they are cheating on you. It does not take a private investigator to know that every car has an odometer that records mileage. Unless you think the affair is being carried on at the work place or in your home, your cheating spouse has to drive to the meeting place. Now comes the lies. “I’m going to get my golf cleats sharpened at the Mall” reports the cheating husband. You jump in the car, write down the mileage. He leaves and returns. The mileage is now 18 miles more than would be required to go to the mall. You have a problem. The same can be true for those cheating partners who “work late” or “go out with the gang for a beer”. If you simply drove from home to work and back, or from home to work and Chili’s 1/4 mile from the office and then home, why does the car have 11 miles more than that trip would require. This type of monitoring makes it easy for you to get a better idea of when this is happening. It also pays to check around in the car for other evidence. People get sloppy and leave clues all the time, frequently in the car.

If you are in a position to catch your cheating spouse in the act, but they do not know that they have been caught, use your head and DON’T tell let them know. We realize how difficult this is to do. You want to confront them, burn their car or hurt them, but if a divorce is in the making, it will be far better for you emotionally and financially if you keep quiet about catching him/her in the act and get a professional to help you document it the next time. The type of proof we gather, unlike your word, is impossible to twist, distort and make unclear. We get video, gathered by a professional who specializes in gathering evidence and has no interest in lying.