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Thread: Advice for new detectives?

  1. #11
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    Oct 2013
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    East Greenwich, RI
    So much good advice already. I’d add stay on top of your paperwork. It can be overwhelming on major cases. Little things that weren’t important before can surely become so.

    Watch the women and the alcohol. I’ve seen a number of co-workers end up in a bind over those two things. Typically you have more freedom to screw up working plainclothes.

    Don’t trust snitches or polygraphs.

    Working investigations can be super rewarding! Congratulations and good luck!

  2. #12
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    Feb 2011
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    Investigative tactics don't really change. Talk to people, gather evidence. Be inquisitive.

    Listen more than you talk.

    People that have been around a long time might have just been doing it wrong for a long time. Figure things out for yourself.

    Solve crimes vs. clear cases.
    A71593

  3. #13
    banana republican blues's Avatar
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    Aug 2016
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    Blue Ridge Mtns
    Mind the details...both during the investigative process, and especially during interviews and interrogations.

    Listening carefully and watching body language will often provide you most of the information and evidence you need to tear holes in an alibi or post arrest statement. Using their own words and story against themselves is powerful stuff. Be in control. Start off "understanding" and potentially "sympathetic" and only escalate as required. It's easier to raise the heat than lower it.

    The mental chess game was, (for me), the most satisfying aspect of investigations. Having the ammunition to back up your position, (beforehand when possible), goes a long way to getting confessions and pleas.

    Details matter. Don't let others derail your attention to the facts (and the law).

    Be able to write your reports in a clear, unambiguous fashion that won't come back to haunt you when you take the stand. Choose your words carefully.

    Good luck with the new position. (I almost envy you. )
    There's nothing civil about this war.

    Read: Harrison Bergeron

  4. #14
    Site Supporter Hambo's Avatar
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    I was never a detective, but I hear that your uniforms will probably shrink while in the closet. If there's some way you could prevent that...
    "Gunfighting is a thinking man's game. So we might want to bring thinking back into it."-MDFA

  5. #15
    Site Supporter LtDave's Avatar
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    Feb 2011
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    Central AZ
    Be prepared to disprove all the suspect’s alibis as well as proving the elements of the crime. Warrants will become your friend...they really don’t take much time to write, the hardest part of the process often is finding the judge. If you record interviews with your own recording device, you will have to develop a system to retain and retrieve the recordings. You will likely have to have transcripts made in certain cases. I never did recordings of all interviews until I worked IA where I recorded everything. Transcripts became a burden until an outside transcription firm was hired. When defense attorneys learn you normally record all interviews, you will have a tough time on the stand if you can’t produce a recording of a critical interview. You do not want to use a personal cell phone for recordings, photos or work calls.
    The first indication a bad guy should have that I'm dangerous is when his
    disembodied soul is looking down at his own corpse wondering what happened.

  6. #16
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    West TN
    Quote Originally Posted by BehindBlueI's View Post
    Because people put their whole lives on social media, including the crimes they commit. Facebook post of Johnny Mope wearing the same clothes and flashing the same gun as seen in surveillance video of the robbery. Johnny posting "I hit a lick" and fanning out a few hundred books about 30 minutes after the robbery. Using Facebook marketplace, Let Go, etc. to arrange for sales that are actually robbery setups. Gang affiliations. Who knows who, who's threatening who, and then who gets shot. Using the phone number they used on a social media sight to call in a delivery and rob the driver. "Those dumb ass cops don't know Man-Man shot Ray-Ray" type posts. Using Facebook messenger to coordinate a drive-by shooting. Using social media to arrange dope buys. To intimidate witnesses. To communicate false stories to tell at upcoming trials.

    And other stuff. That gives you an idea, though. Even as tech-retarded as I am I've managed to wrap up people based on their social media stupidity, location of their phone, etc.
    ^^^^---Ding! Ding! Ding! We connected a guy to about 12 robberies just by the video from the incidents and the pics he had on his Facebook page. Same face, same clothes, same two-tone pistol with extended mag. Knowing social media and how to navigate them to stay within current court rulings, along with being able to write good search warrants for those phones, are two of the most important skills you can have as a detective now.

  7. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Wondering Beard View Post
    This got my attention.

    I have never been LEO much less a detective, and outside of this forum I don't do social media, so my question is entirely out of ignorance: Why would a detective need to be good at social media and in which way? I assume, perhaps incorrectly, that it's not just about reading social media posts.

    If this question gets into specialized material that is not appropriate for a public forum, don't hesitate to remove my post. :-)
    I put a guy in federal prison for 15 years for felon in possession of a firearm based off a photo of him holding a gun that he posted to Facebook. Went to jury trial and we won, appeals court affirmed. SCOTUS recently refused to hear the case.

  8. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by LSP552 View Post
    So much good advice already. I’d add stay on top of your paperwork. It can be overwhelming on major cases. Little things that weren’t important before can surely become so.

    Watch the women and the alcohol. I’ve seen a number of co-workers end up in a bind over those two things. Typically you have more freedom to screw up working plainclothes.

    Don’t trust snitches or polygraphs.

    Working investigations can be super rewarding! Congratulations and good luck!
    Consider any CI like a pet rattle snake.

  9. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by Wondering Beard View Post
    This got my attention.

    I have never been LEO much less a detective, and outside of this forum I don't do social media, so my question is entirely out of ignorance: Why would a detective need to be good at social media and in which way? I assume, perhaps incorrectly, that it's not just about reading social media posts.

    If this question gets into specialized material that is not appropriate for a public forum, don't hesitate to remove my post. :-)
    Policing is a people job. People, especially younger people, put a tremendous amount of information about themselves on social media or in messaging platforms related to social media.

    It’s not just younger people though. I assisted in a case involving a subject who posted a video clearly threatening to kill his doctors and staff at a hospital. Unsurprisingly, he live streamed himself coming out to surrender when we did a surround and call out during the service of the search and arrest warrants in the case. It’s a brave new world.

    Like TC215 I’ve had prohibited persons posting photos of themselves firearms, people posting photos of narcotics etc. the photo itself is not necessarily enough for a conviction but it is good probable cause for search warrants.
    Last edited by HCM; 08-05-2019 at 09:57 PM.

  10. #20
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    Texas
    In my town recently, a 17 year old killed his uncle over a bicycle and shot another man and then posted it on social media. I think that many who commit this error of posting have low intelligencee.

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