As some of you know, because one of the Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes PIs is now a licensed attorney, our investigations agency has morphed into a law-firm-and-private-investigations agency this past year. Usually, it’s convenient to have an investigator down the hall, but recently the single investigator’s workload (she also works for other attorneys and clients) became overwhelming so it was necessary to sub-contract work to another PI.

Our Search for a Wing Man/Woman

We have 16 combined years as private investigators in our agency, with one of us having nearly three decades experience working in the criminal justice system, so we have high standards by which we measure a quality legal investigator. In our search, these were some of our guidelines:

Legal Acumen and Experience

The last thing we want our investigator to do is to kick in someone’s back door to serve them with a subpoena. This might be juicy stuff in fiction, but in real life it can result in lawsuits against us for failing to adequately investigate the background of our investigator. Ideally, we wanted someone who has extensive familiarity with the legal issues that arise during investigative activities such as rules of process service, laws of privacy, awareness of the fair debt collection practices act, legal definition of stalking, laws of eavesdropping and wiretapping.

Tenacity

A good investigator never gives up the hunt. We can’t count the number of cases we’ve broken because we stayed that extra fifteen minutes or asked that one last question.

Attention to Detail

It’s one thing to see the big picture in a case, or to know the goal, but it’s another to magnify a piece of the case and extract that telling detail that could crack it.

Must Like People

We wanted a private investigator who likes and deals well with people. Sure, we all love the tough-guy private eye in movies and books who grouches and argues and gets into slug fests, but that’s fiction. In reality, a private investigator needs to understand what makes people tick and how to coax information from them. This means the investigator must be part psychologist, part actor, part confidante, part interrogator and always trustworthy.

Accountability

A private investigator can be all of the above traits, but if he/she fails to respond to phone calls to our office or is suddenly “out of pocket” without explanation for hours or days, these delays can damage a case. Witnesses can disappear, evidence can be altered, crime scenes can be cleaned up…you get the picture.

How We Found the Best

We started out looking for a PI by:

• Contacting a few we’ve worked with in the past, asking if they were interested. One is no longer in the biz, and the other took so long to return our call we realized she was too busy for us.
• Chatting with some of our attorney-clients with whom we’ve worked closely, and whose work habits and practices we respect. One recommended a local PI who specializes in process services among other investigative tasks. When we called this guy, he might as well have answered his phone, “Hello, I Don’t Want Your Case” because after we told him he’d come highly recommended and we’d like to sub-contract work with him, he started telling us a story of woe about his stack of cases. How his caseload is so large, he would have to schedule our cases weeks out. He grumbled about some of his own cases. He might be good for this other attorney, but not us. We don’t need someone who’s too busy and gripes about his own clients to strangers.

Then We Recalled a PI We Contacted Several Years Ago…

We’d needed some last-minute help on a case. We contacted another PI who didn’t have the expertise necessary for our case and recommended we call Investigator X. We called, he wasn’t in, so we left a message. We hired another investigator because we were under a tight deadline, however Mr. X called us back a few hours later, apologized for not being available when we first called, and asked for us to keep him in mind for future cases.

Two years later, we remembered his message. The act of his calling back, and the tone of that voice message, demonstrated he was persistent, professional, engaging and a good businessman. We called him the other day, reminded him of his invitation two years ago to keep him in mind, and hired him for a job. Within twenty-four hours, he proved his legal acumen and experience, his tenacity, his attention to detail, his ability to deal with different personality types, and his accountability. He’s now our wing man.

Whether your a PI or not, this story shows the importance of simple, everyday business practices. You never know when the call you return opens other doors.

Have a great week, Writing PIs

How Do Private Eyes Do That? now available on Kindle and Nook

We’re used to strange phone calls. So when a woman called a few months ago, claiming to be a casting directory for the Amazing Race reality show and asked us to audition, we were polite, hung up, then looked at each other and said, “Crank call.”

Although why someone would go to all the trouble to introduce herself as the casting director of Amazing Race, explain how she found us (from the July 2011 interview with us at Westword magazine: For These Married Denver Detectives, Truth Is More Fun Than Fiction), how the show was seeking a married-PI team to participate in the next Amazing Race show, and how they’d love for us to send them an audition tape, like yesterday, as this was a last-minute casting idea…well, it seemed like a lot of trouble to pretext all that into one crank call.

So we did what any private investigator would do: We did a background check on the caller.  Guess what? She really was a casting director in L.A.

We Took the Bait

We called her back. She did the spiel again (how she found us, how this was a last-minute casting idea, the show was wrapping up its casting but one of the producers got a last-minute idea that a PI-married-team would be a great addition, and would we create an audition tape ASAP? Like maybe even that very day?).

We said we’d think about it. She said she’d send us an application, and oh-by-the-way, we should think about all the cool prizes participants on the show can win…like cars and vacations.

Cool Prizes, But Dumb Idea?

We hung up and talked. We’d never seen the Amazing Race show so we researched it on the Internet.  Wow, she was right…people won cool prizes…and they trekked all over the world doing ridiculous things and getting into conflicts with each other that millions of people witnessed.

We told each other it’d be dumb to do the show. We couldn’t afford to take off for an entire month, could we? But then…wouldn’t it be nice to win a new car. No, no, dumb idea to do the show. But what if we won the million-dollar grand prize?

We’re Ready for Our Close-Ups, Mr. DeMille

We packed up our video equipment and headed out to shoot our audition tape. It took us HOURS to do one 10-minute tape. Why? Because we kept laughing and had to stop shooting. The casting director had emailed us things they’d like to see in the video, and we were doing our darndest to accommodate their requests, but we kept forgetting what it was we were supposed to say, or we said it wrong, or we looked at each other and thought we looked pretty silly. But finally, we finished the audition tape.

We Bared Our Souls in Writing

Then we had to each fill out a 14-page application. Jeez, this was becoming a full day of being Hollywood hopefuls, but we dutifully answered reams of questions such as:

What famous person reminds you of your teammate?

Colleen’s answer: Russell Brand

Shaun’s answer: Katy Perry

What famous person reminds you of yourself?

Colleen’s answer: Meryl Streep

Shaun’s answer: Moses.

What is your biggest pet peeve about your partner?

Colleen’s answer: Mott the Hoople.

Shaun’s answer: She doesn’t like to listen to loud ’70s rock and roll all the time.

Do you speak or read any foreign languages?

Colleen’s answer: A little French.

Shaun’s answer: Barely speak bar-room Spanish.

And the Winner Is…

Within 24 hours, the Amazing Race casting director had our tape, our signed waivers, and 28 pages worth of answers.

And we never heard from her again. Couldn’t believe they didn’t snap us up after those insightful, intriguing answers on those questionnaires.

However, the reporter who did the Westword article loved that we’d been invited to audition by Amazing Race. She talked to her editor, who asked if we’d forward them our audition tape so they could post it along with our interview.

Uh, no thanks. A tape of us running around in fedoras (yes, we wore fedoras in our audition tape), saying all kinds of Amazing Race things about ourselves (yes, we’d love to trek all over the world and eat bugs), and barely suppressing laughter is not what we wanted on the Internet.

Although we sometimes look at that audition tape and laugh at one of the silliest, and fun-est, days we ever spent together.

And no, we’re not going to post that video tape — like ever — here on Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes.

Have a great weekend, Writing PI

To view the video, click this link.

At the bottom of the page in the above link is a form (content below) urging your representative to vote no on the PROTECT IP Act.  To send this message, enter your email address, name and address, then press the “Send to Congress” button.

I am writing to you as a voter in your district. I urge you to vote “no” on cloture for S. 968, the PROTECT IP Act, on Jan. 24th. The PROTECT IP Act is dangerous, ineffective, and short-sighted. It does not deserve floor consideration. I urge my representative to vote “no” on SOPA, the corresponding House bill.

Over coming days you’ll be hearing from the many businesses, advocacy organizations, and ordinary Americans who oppose this legislation because of the myriad ways in which it will stifle free speech and innovation. We hope you’ll take our concerns to heart and oppose this legislation by voting “no” on closure.

At Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes, we’re a couple of PIs who also write…and are also married to each other. This can be great…and sometimes challenging. Today we’ll each answer “what are the pros and cons” of being a married PI team.

Shaun’s Pros

• You really know your partner, there’s no learning curve.
• During those times when you have to improvise or pretext, you can cue your partner and pick up their cues, which makes what you’re trying to accomplish believeable and effective.
• There’s no need to inform your work partner of demands or troubles in your personal life because she knows!

Shaun’s Cons

First of all, I’m a brave man for being the first to answer this question, but I’ve been granted absolute immunity. Here’s my cons:

• You can’t bullshit your partner about anything, and there’s no hiding behind your moods.
• Whereas other households might have two spouses with independent revenue streams, the married-PI couple is often working the same job. If that client’s check bounces, it can hit us hard.
• Chasing cheating spouses can be deleterious to one’s libido. After a night of watching spouses cheat, I’m not always in the mood if you get my drift.

Colleen’s Pros

• Sometimes being a husband-and-wife PI team gets us the case. For example, a client thinks his wife will be meeting her paramour at a swanky restaurant — we can easily fit into that scenario as another couple dining in that restaurant, even being romantic together, versus a PI sitting alone at a table.
• Shaun’s a big-picture person, I’m a detailed person. Together, we get a good snapshot of a case.
• Shaun trained a lot of PIs over the years in his attorney practice, so if I’m working a new type of case, I get the benefit of working side-by-side with a mentor (or having one on call).

Colleen’s Cons

• It’s that big-picture thing. Sometimes I don’t understand how he glosses over the details.
• We’ve had clients who think two-for-the-price-of-one. No, just because we’re married doesn’t mean we each get paid half-price.
• When we’re both in the field, there’s no one to call at home to let the dogs out.

Other news this week

Check out Gerald So’s interview with Colleen at Chatterrific.

Colleen’s mystery eBook, The Zen Man, featuring a fictional married PI-team, is on sale for .99 at Amazon, Nook and
Smashwords through January 18.

Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes’s Answer: Well, we watch how much we drink (whether it’s water in hot weather or warm beverages in cold weather) because it can really hinder a surveillance if you need to go to the bathroom all the time. Yes, there are “wide-mouthed cups” that PIs often take with them on surveillances, but those can be a hassle to use (for women anyway) and what if you fill your cup and need another?  Sorry to be so graphic, but it’s the reality of longer surveillances, so think about this as you write your surveillance scenes.

What else about surveillances at night during the winter? Hunters’ hand-warmers and foot-warmers are handy (and they don’t cause moisture). We’ve tried not to turn on the heater unless it’s absolutely necessary (a dead giveaway if a sitting car suddenly starts running). Some PIs use portable heaters that plug into the AC adaptor. Some cars have heated seats (a turn of the ignition, without turning the engine on, can heat the seat from 85 degrees+).

Those are a few ideas.

Writer’s Question: I was wondering about the windows fogging during winter. One article I read said a small fan unit, also plugged into the lighter, can keep windows clear. Another said a very small electric heater will also keep the windshield from frosting over.

Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes’s Answer: Those sound good. Once, early in our business, we were conducting an all-night surveillance during a chilly spell in December and Colleen decided to talk about plotting a story…Shaun asked her to stop talking because she was fogging up the windows. True story! So if you’re with a PI partner, don’t talk too much Or maybe use something along those lines for a humorous scene.

New review of The Zen Manby Gerald So: “an homage and update of Dashiell Hammett’s Nick and Nora Charles, a well-paced mix of banter, action, and New Age philosophizing.” .99 through January 18 on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords.

We finally ditched our dumb phones in 2011 and got smart ones, as in iPhones. Now that we have ‘em, we can’t believe why we waited so long. Besides being able to check directions, look up phone numbers, research databases and more on the fly, we’ve also become enamoured of a few apps.

For the iPhone

Flashlight. There’s a number of flashlight apps. The one we use is simply called “Flashlight.” Big off/on button that fills the screen, easy to switch it on. We’ve carried flashlights with us since we opened our investigation agency yea many years ago, but we’re always losing flashlights, plus they’re cumbersome to carry, and if you’re not on top of the battery situation you can find — surprise! — you’re stuck in the dark with a weak-lighted or dead flashlight. But with this handy app, which was .99, we can now light up at any time.

TurboScan. Again, there’s a bunch of scan apps. We chose this one because reviews were good. And it is good. After taking a pix of a document, you can adjust the parameters (shorten, lengthen, add width) to encompass the entire doc. Haven’t figured out how to email the doc directly yet, but it’s easy to store a doc scan on the iPhone “Camera Roll” and email that image. We used to feel smart carting a remote scanner, which was heavy and clunky, into courthouses to scan file docs…now we just use TurboScan on our iPhones. $1.99.

VoiceRecorderHD. With this app, we can record witness interviews with our iPhones, link it to Dropbox (another app we’re fond of) for file transfer or instead connect the iPhone to our Mac and download the voice file that way. $1.99.

Lumin. Sometimes you gotta read the fine print…and sometimes you gotta read the fine print in the dark. Lumin works like a magnifying glass…lets you read the fine print, even capture the image so you can zoom in on a part of it for closer inspection, and if you’re in dim or no lighting, Lumin also provides a light for viewing. Cool. $1.99.

For the iPad

Evernote. We’re digging Evernote on our iPad, but still learning how to manipulate it on our iPhones (some apps just seem too large for an iPhone, y’know?). But on the iPad, this app is a winner. One of the Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes PIs now carries her iPad to all witness interviews and uses Evernote to take notes, pictures, voice recordings…then sends the report immediately afterward to the attorney-client. You can use the free version or upgrade for a nominal fee (something like $1.99). We went for the upgrade.

There you have it. Our current 4 favorite apps for the iPhone, and one winner for the iPad.

Have a great week, Writing PIs

Like private eye mysteries with thrills, humor and romance? Check out The Zen Man, a 21-st Nick and Nora mystery, now available on Kindle and Nook. Only .99 through January 18.

How a Sleuth Might Track a Missing Person

by Colleen Collins, originally printed in Novelists Inc. January 2012 newsletter NINK

A large percentage of a real-life and fictional PIs’ work involves, to an extent, finding persons whose location is unknown to the PI. For example, a person might be actively avoiding being found, such as a debtor who does not want to be served with a lawsuit. This person might come and go at odd hours or start shimmying in and out a back window instead of using the front door of her residence.

Sometimes the missing person case is more complex, such as a parent who has abducted his child and fled the jurisdiction. In such scenarios, people are more deliberate in their efforts, typically travel farther and attempt to cover their tracks more thoroughly.

If you’re writing a story with a PI or sleuth, your character might be hired to locate someone. A few techniques for finding a person whose location is unknown include:

• Searching databases that contain public records. There are numerous online public records that anyone can search, such as:
  • County assessors’ sites have lists of owners of real property. If the person was not the owner of the residence, you’ll find out who is.  That owner/landlord might have information about the person’s current whereabouts or know someone who does.
  • Privately owned cemeteries and mortuaries maintain burial permits, funeral service registers, funeral and memorial arrangements, obituaries, intermediate orders and perpetual care arrangements. For example, if the missing person recently attended a funeral, a PI can find names of friends and relatives through some of these records.
• Interviewing past and current neighbors as well as relatives, past and current landlords, co-workers and known associates.
• Searching the Internet using Google and other search engines for blogs, images, news and so forth. You’d be surprised what you can find by simply typing a telephone number into the Google browser, for example.
• Looking up bride/groom’s names if there’s been a recent wedding, or one is in the works: Wedding Channel.  Often, photos and lists of guests are also posted.
• Checking Internet communities and social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. We once located a missing person who was on the run, but she still found time to log into her MySpace account and blog away. One search engine that searches dozens of social networking sites with each lookup is Socialmention.
• Conducting surveillances at locations where the subject has been known to hang out, from bars to exercise clubs to softball games.

There are entire books written on the subject of finding missing persons – if you’re writing a story with a missing-person plot, considering purchasing a recent book on the topic. PIstore.com offers a wide variety of books on different investigative specializations.

There are also organizations whose websites offer help with networking, services and resources to find people who are missing – below are several of these sites:

• Let’s Bring Them Home: National missing adults program, partnered with Discovery Channel
• NamUs: National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, a clearing house for missing persons and unidentified decedent records
• National Center for Missing & Exploited Children:  Leading non-profit organization in the U.S. working with law enforcement to address issues involving missing and exploited children.

If your fictional sleuth specializes in missing persons, think about the following character traits:

• How tenacious is your character? This kind of research can be time-consuming, detailed, frustrating, with lots of dead-ends before finding a clue.
• Is your sleuth a people person? Because most likely he’ll be talking to a number of people and trying to, in the course of their conversations, pull the nuggets of information he needs.
• What kind of tools does your sleuth use? Does she have access to a computer, proprietary databases, an adequate vehicle to conduct surveillance?  Is he knowledgeable conducting research in public libraries, courthouses and the like?
• Does your sleuth incorporate all of the tools of the PI trade in her search, including trash hits at recently vacated residences for signs as to where the missing party might have been headed?
• Does your sleuth like putting together jigsaw puzzles? Because that’s what locating missing persons is like — assembling varied pieces of information from disparate sources to get, finally, a clear picture.

Have a great 2012, Writing PIs

Like private eye mysteries with thrills, humor and romance? Check out The Zen Man, a 21-st Nick and Nora mystery, now available on Kindle.

One investigative activity we do more than any other is find people.

We find people who are witnesses; long-lost friends; people who might know how to contact a witness; people we need to serve legal papers to; relatives who might know where their cousin, uncle, aunt, grandmother might be…the list goes on and on.

How Do You Spell That?

When looking for a person, the first (and most critical) task is to get the correct spelling of the name. Sounds simple, right? Simple in theory, but it can take some work to get it right. The problem is, lots of people think they know how a name’s spelled — or guess how it’s spelled — and that information filters down to the investigator.

A smart private investigator first asks the source for the spelling of the name, and then double-checks it. For example, a lawyer tells the private investigator to find Sammie Smith. The investigator should ask if Sammie is spelled “Sammie” “Sammy” or does the person go by “Sam” or “Samuel” — and although the name “Smith” sounds like a no-brainer, we’ve gone off the wrong course looking for someone with the surname Smith when actually it was spelled Smythe!

Got Any Other Data?

Of course, a good PI also asks for any other data associated with the name to further narrow the field of people with that same name & spelling. For example, it’s helpful to also have an address or city where the person resides/resided, a date of birth, the name of a spouse, etc.).

What City Does This Dude Live in?

Recently, we read a private eye novel where a criminal told the private eye he should check out a person by the name of (making one up here) Langley Rogers. The private eye didn’t ask any questions (like “How do you spell that?” or “What city does this dude live in?” or “How old’s Langley?” or even “Langley’s a guy, right?”). No, the private eye heard the name, then mentioned it to a police detective who also didn’t ask any questions.

Later in the story, this police detective gets in touch with the private eye and says, “I ran this Langley Rogers in my database. He’s had trouble with the law. He lives in [name of city] but don’t say you heard it from me.”

Uh, did the detective look up a guy whose name is spelled “Langley,” Langlee” “Lang-Lee” (and so on) with the last name spelled “Rogers,” “Rodgers” or ? Even if this fictional detective lucked out and got the spelling right, how many people are named Langley Rogers throughout the U.S.? Could be dozens. Which one is the right guy?

If you’re writing a story and a character says to your sleuth, “Hey, get in touch with Cindy Jones. She knows who killed Max,” your sleuth would be smart to ask, “That’s Cindy with a y, right?”…even smarter to also ask if Cindy/Cindi Jones lives in the neighborhood, how old she is, her husband’s name…

Have a great week, Writing PIs

December 21: Congratulations to Susan who won The Zen Man T-shirt and book!

THE ZEN MAN, a medium-boiled mystery, by one of the Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes PIs, is available! If you like your mysteries full of thrills, humor and romance, THE ZEN MAN is for you. It features Rick and Laura, the “21st-century Nick and Nora” who dig for dirt during the Christmas holidays while dodging bullets, trumped-up charges and the FBI’s unwanted intervention. Unlike their counterparts, only one of The Zen Man’s PI team now drinks martinis…the other is clean and sober after a few Hunter S. Thompson-esque years.

“I loved every single word of The Zen Man!”
~ Delores Fossen, USA Today Best-selling Author

“Move over Sam Spade, Nick and Nora; make room for a Denver who-dun-it, Colleen Collins’s The Zen Man. Brilliant and fast-paced writing. I couldn’t put it down.”
~ Donnell Ann Bell,
 Award-Winning Author of The Past Came Hunting

Holiday Giveaway: THE ZEN MAN eBook and T-shirt

We’re offering a special giveaway: a free THE ZEN MAN eBook and a THE ZEN MAN T-shirt (picture below — it’s a beaut. Organic cotton, baby). How to win? Leave a comment today (Dec 20) or tomorrow (Dec 21). We’ll pick a name late on Dec 21 — be sure to leave your email when you post your comment so we can write you. Sizes available: M or L.

The Zen Man eBook on Sale for .99 Through December 25

Because of its Christmas setting, THE ZEN MAN is on sale at Amazon for .99 through Christmas Day. Yep, just under a buck. No Kindle? No problem. Amazon offers a free, easy-to-download app so you can read the book on your PC, Mac or other device. You can even gift it by clicking the “Give as a Gift” button on the right side of the Amazon The Zen Man page – all you need is the person’s email address.

Wishing you a safe, fun holiday, Writing PIs

Maybe you know someone writing a story featuring a private eye, or someone who’s a PI-genre fan, or someone who’s intrigued about the world of private investigators. Hey, maybe that person is you. Below are two books by Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes’s private investigators about the real world of private investigations. Below that are a few links to some recent articles about private investigations for your reading pleasure.

How to Write a Dick: A Guide for Writing Fictional Sleuths from a Couple of Real-Life Sleuths

Geared mostly to writers writing sleuths, with plenty of info for those wanting to read more about the real-life world of whodunits. Topics include a history of private investigators, a sampling of private investigative specializations (from legal investigations to pet detectives to investigating white-collar crime), the ins and outs of a private investigator’s business (from licensing to marketing), homicide investigations, a DNA Primer and a “Gumshoe Glossary.”

How to Write a Dick is an eBook, but you don’t need an ereader. Both Amazon and Barnes & Noble provide free apps that are easy to download onto your laptop, desktop, other device.  Want to give as a gift? All you need is the person’s email address.

How to Write a Dick on Kindle

How to Write a Dick on Nook

How Do Private Eyes Do That?

Geared to the armchair sleuth, with plenty of info for writers, investigators, and others interested in the techniques and tools of today’s private investigators. Dozens of articles about private investigations on such topics as how to catch a cheater, techniques for finding people, how to locate a cell phone number, tips for locating a family trust, email security tips, how to unblock incoming blocked phone numbers, intellectual property investigations, the art of interviewing witnesses, listening devices, sleuth gadgets…we’re running out of breath, here…online research tips, how to search for people on YouTube, case examples, a listing (plus links) of several dozen private investigator blogs and PI-genre writers…and a whole lot more.

“If you’re looking for the lowdown on private investigations, this is it. Packed with details and insights. A must-have for anybody writing private-eye fiction and for anybody who’s curious about what being a private-eye is really like.” ~ Bill Crider, author of the Sheriff Dan Rhodes series and many other novels in multiple genres

“A must have for any writer serious about crafting authentic private eyes. Collins knows her stuff.” ~ Lori Wilde, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author

To order How Do Private Eyes Do That?

Same as above — you don’t need an ereader to download this book. Both Amazon and Barnes & Noble make it easy (and free) to download an app onto your PC/Mac/other device to read this book. If you want to send it as a gift, all you need is the person’s email address.

How Do Private Eyes Do That? on Kindle

How Do Private Eyes Do That? on Nook