Tod: Okay, this is the How to do Stuff Podcast. I'm Tod Maffin. I'm now going to affix the microphone on our subject. Now, the ground rules of this were that we're not identifying your name. P.I. : We don't identify my name, we don't identify the area where I work and we don't identify any clients. Tod: Okay, but we can say that you're a private investigator for the insurance industry. P.I. : Yeah, you can say that. Sure.
Tod: Good, because I just did. So it might be too late.
P.I. : That's fine. Tod: So how long have you had experience investigating?
P.I. : I first started this in 1992.
Tod: So, a while now.
P.I. : So that would be 13 years.
Tod: So, my question is, how do you spy on someone?
P.I. : Okay.
Well, first of all, I have to say that doing this kind of work is not glamorous like it is portrayed on television, of course. In fact, it's very often very boring. Okay, so how do you spy on somebody? Well, it depends what you want to find out about them, so the client, first of all, has to outline to us what they're looking for. There are no general rules, because every file that you get is usually different, so you would adopt different techniques for doing different kinds of work and obtaining different objectives.
Tod: Okay.
P.I. : For instance, if you were doing a surveillance operation, whereby you were waiting for somebody to come out of their house or some such thing, firstly, you don't use a flashy car like they portray in the movies. Tod: Oh.
P.I. : You don't use a Corvette. If you're a private investigator, you don't use anything that's going to attract attention to you. Tod: What would be the most generic, average, blend-in car, if you could pick the perfect car?
P.I. : Well, something that's there's a million on the road. Tod: Okay.
P.I. : Any kind of car that's about five to 10 years old. If you want names, let's say a Pontiac Sunfire or a Cavalier or a Honda Civic. Tod: Kind of like a generic brand of car.
P.I. : Yeah, anything that there is a lot of because that doesn't attract attention. Tod: Right.
P.I. : The worst thing you can do is like they did in the movies when they drive Lincolns and Lamborghinis and goodness knows.
Tod: Yeah, right.
P.I. : I mean true-to-life investigators don't do that. Tod: And do you dress differently or…?
P.I. : No.
You dress like normal people do.
Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : You don't dress absurdly, but, hopefully, it doesn't make a lot of difference what you dress in because, hopefully, nobody is going to see you anyway. Tod: Right, right.
P.I. : Okay.
It's nice if you have tinted windows in your vehicle because you can see them, but they can't see you. You park in a place that's not within eyeshot of their living room, for instance. Tod: If they can't see you, how can you see them? P.I. : Well, it's not necessarily seeing them, because in this province it's against the law to look into somebody's living room anyway, but you can see them leave. Tod: Wait, really? In this province you're not allowed to look into someone's home, even if you're standing on public property? P.I. : If you have a video camera you cannot point the video camera in somebody's living room in this province. Tod: Wow. (Inaudible 3:42) by the province, by the way.
P.I. : If somebody goes into the house and you're videotaping them, for instance, going into the house, then that's different. Tod: That's fine, ha. P.I. : Yeah.
Oh, yeah, but there's a lot of strict rules. There again, this is different from like it's portrayed on TV and in the movies because there's a lot of restrictions as to what you can do and what you can't do in Canada. It doesn't matter what province you're in. Your client will also give you restrictions on what you can do and what you can't do. Tod: Why would they have restrictions?
P.I. : Because they don't want to leave themselves open to any kind of liability. If it's a public body, if it's a public crown corporation, then they don't want to be in any kind of situation that would result in litigation against them, other than what the main principle thing is. Tod: Is it ever beneficial for you to be in contact with the person you're spying on? P.I. : Never, never.
Tod: No, really? Even if you pretend to be someone else and ask them if they could…let's say you want them to move their car so you can get a better view, you wouldn't actually go up and make up some sort of cover story? P.I. : No, because there's a very fine line, again, in Canada between what's entrapment. If you get somebody to do something that they would not normally do in order to put them in a position where you can get some good videotape that will not be accepted in court.
On the other hand, if they are doing something that they do in the course of their job then that's okay. That's not entrapment. Tod: Do you use special hidden spy camera, like quiet and small?
P.I. : Yup, you can do that.
Tod: Yeah, really?
P.I. : Yeah.
Tod: So all the little gadgets that you see in these spy stores are fairly legitimate?
P.I. : Oh, yeah, yeah. You can put them in briefcases and you can put them in lapel cameras and all that kind of thing. That's perfectly legitimate. Tod: One of the stories that I'm aware of that happened is with a family member of yours. You were trying to spy on someone who was at a provincial park or a park of some kind and they were vacationing and so you coaxed the family member into pretending to be in the video. Can you walk me through how that worked, because I thought that was quite a clever maneuver?
P.I. : Well, yeah. The main thing is that we had pre-knowledge of what this fellow would probably be doing. This particular fellow was supposed to be injured and not able to do anything, so it was an insurance claim. So, therefore, we didn't get him to do anything that he wasn't going to do anyway and to sit on a park bench with a video camera going and he happened to be in it is perfectly legal. Tod: Right.
So you positioned your family member between you and your target and you made it appear as if you were shooting the family member when, in fact, the view finder, you were actually shooting at the guy behind her.
P.I. : Yeah, yeah.
Tod: And did he ever find out?
P.I. : No.
Tod: Did it go to court? Do these things very often get to court or usually?
P.I. : I think we did go to court, yes.
Tod: I would imagine when your client says, but wait a minute, we have videotape of you doing that.
P.I. : Yeah.
Very often if you have something where the videotape obviously is going to shoot down an insurance claim then it's not going to go to trial. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : Does it very often go to court? Well, the kind of work that I'm involved in, probably less than five percent. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : Obviously, many are actually settled on the courtroom steps, so to speak.
Tod: How do you walk quietly?
P.I. : In what way?
Tod: I don't know…if you're like trying to sneak around someone's house. P.I. : You don't sneak. You cannot sneak. If you're on somebody's property and you don't have their permission you're trespassing. There again, it's part of the restrictions that you've got in Canada. You cannot do that.
If you're a legitimate private investigator the work that you do has to be able to be presented in court. I don't care what kind of work you're doing, whether it's divorce work or whatever. Tod: Right.
P.I. : Now, the kind of work that I'm involved in it has to be completely legitimate. You can't go on private property, unless you have permission, because that's trespassing. You can't shoot anybody doing something that would be in a compromising position, for example, in their living room. You can't shoot video near schools because of the fact that you're near children. Tod: Even if you have permission of the principal?
P.I. : Well, it's difficult. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : You know, you're opening…technically, yes, you can, if you get permission from the school, but very often, there again, the client doesn't want you to do that. Tod: Yeah, right.
How do you tail someone in a car?
P.I. : Okay.
This gets back to what I said originally and that is that you have to have a car that's nondescript. It takes a lot of experience. Now, with traffic all over the place being as bad as it is, you've got to be right on their tail and, yet, a lot of people don't look in their rearview mirror to see who's behind them. Tod: Really?
P.I. : So, you can stay behind somebody for hours and they wouldn't know it. Tod: How do you tell, as the investigator, whether or not they've figured out that you're tailing them? P.I. : Well, because they do irrational things. They would go off this street and come back on that street and slow down.
Tod: And then what do you do in response?
P.I. : Well, I would break it off because there's no point. If they know that they're being followed, then what is the point of following them? Tod: Right.
P.I. : Because they're not going to do what you want them to do. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : The object of following somebody is to see where they go.
Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : So if he's not going to work and he's doing other things then…I mean that's the whole object of it. Tod: What was the biggest bust you ever made?
P.I. : Well, it depends what you mean by the biggest bust.
Tod: Like the one that you put the most effort into or the one that you were more sneaky around.
P.I. : The kind of work I do is mostly insurance work, so I would say that the biggest bust, as you call it, would be the one that got the biggest claim or, hopefully, the smallest claim.
Tod: Right.
Yeah, I guess, for the client.
P.I. : Yeah.
I don't think I can answer that. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : Because there's so many that I've done and very often I don't know what they get. Tod: Right, right.
P.I. : Yeah.
Tod: Good. Do you like doing it?
P.I. : Um, sometimes it gets a bit boring. I like interviewing people. I like doing the assisting on pretrial work and stuff like that. I don't do a lot now, personally, of sitting in a car all day; although, I've done some the last month or so, but I don't do much of that. And if that's all the job was, I wouldn't do it because I'd just get fed up with it. Tod: Yeah.
P.I. : It is a boring job if you've got to sit watching somebody's driveway for eight hours, which guys do. Tod: I know, yeah.
P.I. : Even if you're a private investigator or you're an investigator in the police force, it's still a boring job. Tod: Yeah.
It's not like a stakeout where there was something always on the go. P.I. : Nah.
Tod: No, alright.
P.I. : Not at all.
Tod: Thanks very much, John Doe.
P.I. : You're very welcome.
