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Checklist for Hiring a Private Investigator
Looking for an old friend? Want to know if your spouse is cheating? Need to check out a potential tenant or employee? A good private investigator (PI) can help you obtain these answers. And as with any expert you hire-a doctor, a lawyer, an insurance broker-it benefits you to take the time to ensure you're hiring a professional who has experience, quality reputation, and good-business ethics. Below is a checklist that will help you find just such a private investigator: 1. Ask friends, business associates, your lawyer for a referral. Word of mouth gives you the inside scoop, and the opportunity to ask questions specific to your needs. 2. Check your state's private investigator associations, most of which have web sites that post their membership directory. 3. If you can't find a private investigation association for your state, there are multiple national PI organizations that refer investigators, such as The National Association of Investigative Specialists (http://www.pimall.com/nais/dir.menu.html). Also, check your state's legal organizations-for example, affiliates of the American Trial Lawyer's Association or the state defense bar-which typically have a directory of recommended investigators. 4. Insurance companies use PIs constantly. Especially if your needs fall into surveillance and background checks, an excellent resource is your own homeowners insurance company. Ask to speak to a claims representative. With a few inquiries, you should be able to pinpoint which investigators your insurance company uses, which is a good referral. 5. Check Internet and Yellow Pages for private investigator listings, but remember these are paid-for ads. Ask for references; check if the PI is licensed (most states require a PI to be licensed, a few don't); if you're going before a judge and jury, ask if the PI has courtroom experience. NOTE: An untrained investigator may not know the laws and end up doing something illegal during an investigation-which causes you problems. 6. Before you speak to an investigator, decide what's in your budget. 7. When you speak to an investigator, ask if he/she has done the type of work you're seeking. More important, ask them the outcome of that type of investigation. 8. Ask to see examples of reports they've produced for similar cases. 9. Gauge your comfort level while speaking to the investigator. Good communication will be critical after the investigation begins. Also, be open minded-your investigator may have new ideas that are worthy of exploration. 10. Expect to pay a retainer up front. Just because a PI doesn't ask for one (or even a reasonable hourly rate), doesn't mean he/she is better at what they do. You want to hire someone who's competent, not hard up for work. Remember, a good private investigator can be your best resource! Subscribe to Highlands Investigations & Legal Services, Inc. free quarterly e-newsletter, which provides leading-edge legal, forensic, investigative articles, and more. All subscribers are automatically eligible for free gift drawings. To subscribe, go to http://www.highlandsinvestigations.com. Colleen Collins, Highlands Investigations and Legal Services, Inc. Highlands Investigations & Legal Services, a product of two logically related sets of background and training--attorney and information specialist--offers a unique blend of investigative and writing/research skills. To learn more about our services, go to www.highlandsinvestigations.com">http://www.highlandsinvestigations.com
MORE RESOURCES: Families of Julie and Jessica Richards from Brisbane, and Gavin Dallow and Julie Hosking in Adelaide, confirm deaths
Here are some edited excerpts from this afternoon’s press conferences with police and health officials, plus a volcano expert.
New Zealand police have released the names of nine confirmed victims. Seven of them are Australian, two are New Zealanders. Continue reading...Jubilation at result but region faces long process ahead before it can become world’s newest nation The autonomous region of Bougainville has voted overwhelmingly in favour of becoming independent from Papua New Guinea, paving the way for the group of islands to become the world’s newest nation. More than 180,000 people in Bougainville, a collection of islands flung 700km off the coast of Papua New Guinea in the Solomon Sea, participated in a referendum over the last few weeks that has been nearly 20 years in the making. Continue reading...Labour and the Conservatives in scramble for votes on the final day of campaigning
Here’s Labour’s campaign ad this morning, invoking the Blitz spirit. Let's get back on track. pic.twitter.com/nITBAzhJUO Continue reading...Company hails start of the ‘electric aviation age’ after 15-minute test flight in Vancouver The world’s first fully electric commercial aircraft has taken its inaugural test flight, taking off from the Canadian city of Vancouver and flying for 15 minutes. “This proves that commercial aviation in all-electric form can work,” said Roei Ganzarski, chief executive of Australian engineering firm magniX. Continue reading...
Democratic congressional leaders have unveiled articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, a historic move set in motion by a whistleblower complaint warning the president was using the power of his office to solicit foreign interference in a US election. Related: Five key takeaways from the Democrats’ articles of impeachment against Trump Continue reading...Panel recruited to ensure objectivity cite failure to agree formal process with police complaints commission A panel of foreign experts overseeing an investigation into allegations of excessive force used by the Hong Kong police force has said it is stepping down, further calling into question the probe. For months anti-government protesters have been demanding an independent investigation into allegations of police brutality in response to the demonstrations. The government has repeatedly said an independent inquiry is unnecessary and that the existing police watchdog, the Independent Police Complaints Council (IPCC), should complete its review first. Continue reading...Scale and speed of loss much higher than predicted, threatening inundation for hundreds of millions of people Greenland’s ice sheet is melting much faster than previously thought, threatening hundreds of millions of people with inundation and bringing some of the irreversible impacts of the climate emergency much closer. Ice is being lost from Greenland seven times faster than it was in the 1990s, and the scale and speed of ice loss is much higher than was predicted in the comprehensive studies of global climate science by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, according to data. Continue reading...Genaro García Luna, who ran Mexico’s federal police for six years, charged with accepting briefcases of cash to protect Sinaloa cartel A former minister who was considered an architect of Mexico’s war on drugs has been arrested on charges that he allowed the Sinaloa cartel to operate with impunity in exchange for briefcases stuffed with cash. Genaro García Luna, who oversaw the creation of Mexico’s federal police, was arrested in Texas on Monday. Continue reading...The literature laureateship, presented to Handke and 2018 laureate Olga Tokarczuk on Tuesday afternoon, faces boycotts and widespread protest As Turkey joins Albania and Kosovo in boycotting Tuesday’s Nobel prize ceremony for Peter Handke over his support for Slobodan Milosevic’s genocidal regime, war correspondents from Christiane Amanpour to Jeremy Bowen are protesting his win by sharing their harrowing stories from the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. The Austrian writer, whose stance on the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s and attendance at Milosevic’s funeral have been widely criticised, is due to receive his Nobel medal in Stockholm, where a large protest demonstration is expected. Continue reading...
The Pentagon announced on Tuesday it was halting operational training of all Saudi Arabian military personnel in the United States until further notice in the wake of the deadly shooting by a Saudi air force officer. The decision will have far-reaching impacts, including grounding more than 300 Saudi Arabian military aviation students. Continue reading...Marina Hyde, Rob Davies, Simon Hattenstone and Daniel Lavelle were all honoured Four Guardian journalists have been honoured at this year’s British Journalism Awards for their work for the title, which was itself highly commended in the news provider of the year category. At the ceremony at the Hilton Bankside hotel in central London on Tuesday night, Marina Hyde was described as “clever, innovative and consistently on the ball” as she was handed the prize for Comment Journalism. She was recognised for her writing on subjects including Theresa May’s historic Brexit deal defeat, Prince Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein and Boris Johnson. Continue reading...The Union Carbide factory explosion remains the world’s worst industrial accident – but as its dreadful legacy becomes increasingly apparent, victims are still waiting for justice The residents of JP Nagar have no way to escape their ghosts. This ramshackle neighbourhood, on the outskirts of the Indian city of Bhopal, stands just metres away from the chemical factory which exploded just after midnight on 2 December 1984 and seeped poison into their lives forever. The blackened ruins of the Union Carbide plant still loom untouched behind the factory walls. Related: The Bhopal disaster victims still waiting for justice 35 years on – in pictures Continue reading...Photographer Judah Passow has documented those were affected by the Bhopal disaster 35 years ago, which killed an estimated 25,000 people ad has left more than 150,000 suffering from chronic medical conditions Judah Passow has waived his fee for this work. Contributions to the Bhopal Medical Appeal can be made at www.bhopal.org Continue reading...Exclusive: With heatwaves predicted to worsen dramatically over the next 30 years, many big US cities are failing to fully plan to protect those most vulnerable to extreme heat When heatwaves hammered US cities this summer, one of the hottest in recorded history, some city governments had plans in place to protect their most at-risk residents. Philadelphia’s plan sent homeless outreach teams to distribute water and bring people to cooling centers. Austin’s plan suspended electricity shutoffs for low-income or fixed-income customers. Chicago’s plan dispatched building inspectors to monitor shelters and other buildings without air conditioning. Continue reading...Musicians say Porto’s DIY studio complex Stop is a crucial arts space in a city dominated by tourism, but authorities say it’s unsafe and must close All photographs by Mark Scholes A mile east of the Luís I Bridge in the middle of a residential neighbourhood in Porto, Portugal’s second city, sits a bleak and decaying building. Initially a three-storey car park, then a thriving shopping centre, the building has more recently suffered from years of neglect. Its walls are sprayed with graffiti and plastered with stickers, and the windows are blacked out. Continue reading...The mood may be one of despair, but this election is critical to the country’s future. The best hope lies with Labour, despite its flaws Britain has not faced a more critical election in decades than the one it faces on Thursday. The country’s future direction, its place in the world and even its territorial integrity are all at stake, primarily because this is a decisive election for Brexit. The choice is stark. The next prime minister is going to be either Boris Johnson, who is focused on “getting Brexit done” whatever the consequences, or Jeremy Corbyn, who with a Labour-led government will try to remodel society with a programme of nationalisation and public spending. Continue reading...Supt Robyn Williams may be sacked before appeal against conviction can be heard A decorated senior Metropolitan police officer controversially convicted of possessing a child abuse video is facing a fast-track dismissal from the force, the Guardian has learned. Supt Robyn Williams could end up being sacked within months for gross misconduct, before her appeal against her conviction can be heard. Continue reading...Europe is awaiting the result of Thursday’s poll with trepidation, worried by what the consequences might be for the EU Continue reading...Brutal winter, poor healthcare and limited food raises fears for welfare of infant, born to Sydney woman Rayan Hamdoush An Australian woman has given birth to a baby boy in the al-Hawl camp in Syria, prompting revived calls for Australia to rescue 67 nationals still held in the camp. Rayan Hamdoush, 24, from western Sydney, was pregnant when she entered al-Hawl. She gave birth to the boy on 30 November. The boy’s father, Samer Hajj Obeid, also from Sydney, is missing. Continue reading...Repentance, reparation and remedy for the terrible damage done to the people of Bayelsa state in Nigeria is long overdue The Universal Declaration of Human Rights begins: “All human beings … should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” It is now widely acknowledged that human rights cannot be enjoyed without a safe, clean and healthy environment. The right to a healthy environment is enshrined in more than 100 constitutions all over the world because human and environmental rights are intertwined. However, despite the endorsement of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, oil companies exploiting irreplaceable resources in the Niger Delta are callously flouting fundamental human rights. That is the conclusion I have been forced to draw from my work as chair of the Bayelsa State Oil and Environmental Commission (BSOEC). Continue reading...Executive order could redefine Judaism as a race or nationality, which critics argue is itself antisemitic Donald Trump is expected to sign an executive order on Wednesday targeting antisemitism on college campuses. First reported by the New York Times, the policy would broaden the federal definition of antisemitism, according to administration officials who spoke to various news outlets on condition of anonymity. By expanding protections granted by Title VI of the Civil Rights Act to people subjected to antisemitism, the order could also redefine Judaism as a race or nationality. Continue reading...The new bill is designed to respond to a revolt from conservative religious organisations that forced the Coalition to miss its self-imposed deadline On 10 December, Scott Morrison and the attorney general, Christian Porter, released the second draft religious discrimination bill. The new bill is designed to respond to a revolt from conservative religious organisations that forced the Coalition to miss its self-imposed deadline to introduce the bill to parliament by year’s end. Continue reading...Humanitarian agencies say Rohingya people displaced by violence in Rakhine state are forced to live in ‘apartheid-like’ facilities The UK has broken ranks with the UN and is continuing to put money into squalid Rohingya “apartheid-like” camps, despite a policy designed to avoid complicity in Myanmar’s rights abuses, the Guardian has learned. Internal briefing documents as well as interviews with UN and humanitarian agency officials in Myanmar showed the British government was maintaining a policy of providing aid and other support to displaced people living in camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine state that have been slated for closure since 2017. Continue reading...Premier League leaders urged to join fight for better working conditions as they prepare for Fifa Club World Cup match As Liverpool fans stream into Qatar to watch the Fifa Club World Cup next week, it will be easy to forget the thousands of workers from the poorest countries in the region who have toiled for years to construct its glittering buildings. When they take their seats at the Khalifa International Stadium, where Liverpool will play their semi-final match, they may not realise that scores of workers who refurbished the stadium were housed in filthy, overcrowded accommodation with an ever-present stench of raw sewage. Continue reading...As a doctors’ and nurses’ strike paralyses Zimbabwe’s health system, one woman has delivered 100 babies in her flat •Photographs by Cynthia R Matonhodze Six expectant mothers groan through their labour pains in the lounge of a tiny two-roomed apartment in Mbare, Zimbabwe’s oldest township. Sweating and visibly in pain, a heavily pregnant woman peeps through the window to catch a breath while others lie on the floor. Continue reading...The devastating disease can’t be stopped unless more protection is provided for patients and health workers Entering the city of Goma as night fell, I saw the red lava glowing atop nearby Mount Nyiragongo – an ominous reminder of the insecurity hovering over the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s volatile east. But a manmade – not natural – terror is keeping health workers in DRC awake tonight. Continue reading...Rights groups condemn hanging of Mooketsi Kgosibodiba and call on president to bring country into line with the rest of Africa The new president of Botswana is facing pressure to abolish the country’s death penalty after last week’s surprise execution of a 44-year-old man for murder. Mooketsi Kgosibodiba, a bricklayer, had been on death row since 2017 after strangling his employer in a row over stolen cement. Last week the government made the unexpected announcement that he had been hanged in Gaborone central prison. Continue reading...White Island’s eruption is a reminder that we are not nature’s master, but at its whim At 2.11pm yesterday, as the Whakaari eruption was happening, I was out mowing my lawns. From my home at Te Kaha, a tiny settlement on the North Island’s east coast, you can make out the volcano’s sunken crater. The 300-metre dust cliffs frame the northern and southern edges, and in the centre is an east-facing pit where ancient birders and old sulphur miners once did their work. On Monday the only workers and visitors on island were tour operators and tourists, several whom never made it back from yesterday’s destruction. Continue reading...Monitoring for hydrothermal eruptions is a huge challenge as the eruption is caused by steam, not magma, which is harder to track Five people have been confirmed dead, 31 remain in hospital with injuries and eight are still missing after sudden volcanic eruptions on Whakaari/White Island off the east coast of New Zealand. The island is a tourist destination and 47 people were on it when it erupted on Monday afternoon. Three of those rescued have now been discharged from hospital. Continue reading...The tranche of documents show that in trying to paint the best pictures, those involved delivered the worst During the Vietnam war, the daily US military briefings were known to journalists as the Five O’ Clock Follies, described by one of the AP reporters who attended them as “the longest-playing tragicomedy in south-east Asia’s theatre of the absurd”. The Pentagon Papers, the Department of Defense’s secret history of that war, leaked by Daniel Ellsberg in 1971, only underlined the level of that deception under subsequent US presidents. Continue reading...Trump’s neglect of the region has left a political vacuum that China is rushing to fill – and small nations such as the Solomon Islands are stuck in the middle If anything demonstrates the interconnectedness of the 21st-century world, it is how a decision made in the Solomon Islands, population 650,000, in the remote South Pacific, can affect the behaviour of powerful countries on the other side of the globe. That, in a way, is exactly what happened last week when Nato leaders met in London. Top of their agenda was Donald Trump’s demand that Europe pay more for its defence. But why is the US so exercised about so-called “burden-sharing”? In part because, these days, it is looking west, not east. The US has identified China, not Russia, as the biggest strategic, economic and potential military rival to its global leadership. Barack Obama, who was dubbed the “Pacific president”, formalised this shift with his 2011 “pivot to Asia”, which prioritised the region. Continue reading...Sarah Stuart-Black at New Zealand's civil defence ministry says recovering the bodies of those killed on Whakaari/White Island is 'an absolute imperative'. John Tims of New Zealand police says the resources are standing by to go back to the island 'as soon as we are confident there are no risks'. Conditions on New Zealand’s Whakaari/White Island have worsened, hampering the retrieval of those killed in Monday's volcanic explosion. Volcanologist Graham Leonard says volcanic activity has increased at the site and that there is a risk of another eruption like Monday’s. Leonard also says it would be challenging for rescuers to breath, see or walk on the island given the current activity. House Democrats have introduced two articles of impeachment against Donald Trump for high crimes and misdemeanours. At a press conference announcing the move, the House judiciary committee chair Jerry Nadler accused the president of betraying public trust and endangering US national security to benefit himself
The families of those missing after the White Island eruption in New Zealand say they are 'standing together' as they wait for information about their loved ones. Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand's prime minister, said the scale of the disaster was 'devastating' and that reconnaissance flights had found no sign of life on the island. Police have launched an inquiry into the eruption after at least six people died and many more were injured
Houston's police chief Art Acevedo criticised politicians for not standing up to the National Rifle Association after the the fatal shooting of an officer. 'The NRA doesn't like the fact that we want to take firearms out of the hands of boyfriends that abuse their girlfriends. And who killed our sergeant? A boyfriend abusing his girlfriend,' Acevedo said Continue reading...A protester, appearing on the side of President Donald Trump and against impeachment, shouted at committee chairman Jerry Nadler, a New York Democrat, that he and the Democrats are committing 'treason' in their inquiry Continue reading...New Zealand’s Whakaari/White Island volcano erupted on Monday at 2.11pm as 50 people were visiting the country's most active volcano. At least five people were killed and authorities confirmed some people were still waiting to be rescued hours after the eruption on the island, as experts explained it was unsafe for emergency services to return
Footage shows island in the Bay of Plenty coated with ash after volcano blew debris 12,000m into the air. The film also shows a downed helicopter and tourists stranded on the island waiting to be rescued by boat. Continue reading... |
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10 Steps for Business Owners to Take if They Are a Victim of Identity Theft Be aware that 40 million crooks obtained credit card numbers this past year, "Be Suspicious". Also be aware that most identify theft is not reported, especially when it involves family members, so the statistics are off. 5 Tips to Manage and Organize E-Mail How do you focus on your urgent e-mail and organize the rest for your review? Think about how you handle your paper mail. You probably sort your paper mail quickly before you read it to figure out what to look at first, what to read later, and what to throw away. Bookkeeping Techniques For Morons Please don't think I am calling you a "moron" to hurt your feelings in any way. I was a moron when I first started setting up my files. How To Make Money With Your Junk Mail The term "junk mail" is a well-known term. 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