A Hingham incident shows how those who use (or misuse) GPS tracking systems can face civil and criminal prosecution. General rule is that the owner (or joint owners) of the vehicle can install a GPS tracking system. Anyone else may face an invasion of privacy suit -- or worse. Case law continues to evolve here.

Tags: private investigator, right to privacy

In the race to the low price swamp, it has long been suspected that some firms offer background checks at prices they cannot afford without cutting corners ( "national criminal check"' for $4.95 anyone?). A shabby product is the logical result.

Tags: private investigator, kroll, fraud, USIS

Tags: ekman, body language

Boston Globe reports a federal judge tossed out the conviction of former US senator Ted Stevens after the Justice Department admitted its prosecutors mishandled evidence in the corruption case. Two prosecutors did not turn over notes from an interview in April 2008 with the case's key witness--notes that contained exculpatory evidence. Veteran defense investigators know this is a not uncommon phenomenon: several agents from different agencies sit in on one interview, and their notes differ vastly from the "official report" that is eventually turned over to the defense. Always good practice to identify everyone at the meeting, and review notes from everyone present.

Prosecutors who handled the trial have been removed from the case and their conduct is under investigation.

Tags: stevens, private investigator, prosecution misconduct, criminal defense

News reports are exaggerating the impact of a new Supreme Judicial Court ruling in Massachusetts on a police officer's right to stop and frisk suspects for weapons. This right was established in 1968 in the Supreme Court case Terry v. Ohio. In Commonwealth v. Paul Gomes, the SJC held that conducting a pat frisk of a suspect solely on a general concern that he was in a high crime area violates the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures. Key line in the SJC case : " Officer Walsh gave no testimony that the police observed anything suggesting that the defendant had a weapon." Coupled with no weapons priors for Gomes, the search was found to be unreasonable.

No new law here. Just a reminder that, if no requirement existed for specific suspicions about a suspect, residents in high-crime areas could be pat frisked while simply walking in their neighborhood.

Tags: search and seizure, criminal defense, gomes sjc

Last week, traveled to Argentina with the Boston Braves Football Club, and played against retired veteran from legendary clubs Boca Juniors and River Plate, as well as others. We did OK (no scores please), but the rat-a-tat-passing and superior ball skills of the Argentines was impressive . With help from my amigos, I witnessed an interesting incident at a Buenos Aires shop whereby an owner grilled an employee over suspected theft (in the open-- a slight departure from USA custom). Owner asked, "What do you think I should do to the person who stole the . . .?" This was interesting: many US interview courses teach this as a key component during the interview process. Called the punishment question by some (Reid), truthful suspects are open to some degree of appropriate punishment.

Tags: interviewing, interrogation, lie detection