Metts Investigations specializes in Domestic and Insurance surveillance...
The Private Investigator Career Field
According to a study by the Department of Transportation, private detectives and investigators held about 55,000 jobs in 1994. About 20 percent were self employed. About 34 percent of wage and salary workers worked for detective agencies and about 40 percent were employed as store detectives in department or clothing and accessories stores. Others worked for hotels and other lodging places, legal services firms, and many other industries.
Private detectives and investigators assist attorneys, government agencies, businesses, and the public with a variety of problems, such as gathering facts, tracing debtors, or conducting background investigations. The main job of private investigators and some private detectives is to obtain information and locate assets or individuals. Some private detectives protect stores and hotels from theft, vandalism, and disorder.
About half of all private investigators are self-employed or work for detective agencies. They specialize in missing persons, infidelity, and background investigations, including financial profiles and asset searches; physical surveillance; on-line computer database searches; and insurance investigations. They may obtain information, interview witnesses, and assemble evidence for litigation or criminal trials. They are assigned to cases by the owner or manager of the firm.
Many investigators spend considerable time conducting surveillance, seeking to observe inconsistencies in a subject's behavior. For example, a person who has recently filed a workers' compensation claim that an injury has made walking difficult should not be able to jog or mow the lawn. If such behavior is observed, the investigator takes video or still photographs to document the activity and reports back to the supervisor or client.
"Stakeouts" are a common form of surveillance. On a stakeout, an investigator regularly observes a site, such as the home of a subject, until the desired evidence is obtained. The investigator sits in a car or other inconspicuous location. They are equipped with cameras-including still and video cameras-binoculars, and a citizen's band radio or a car phone.
Some investigations involve verification of facts, such as an individual's place of employment or income. This might involve a phone call or a visit to the workplace. In other investigations, especially in missing persons cases, the investigator interviews people to learn as much as possible about someone's previous movements.
Computers have changed the nature of this profession and have become an integral part of investigative work. They allow investigators to obtain massive amounts of information in a short period of time from the dozens of on-line data bases containing probate records, motor-vehicle registrations, credit reports, association membership lists, and other information.
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