I have decided not to wait. I am going to convert my Advanced Investigations Diploma into a Edexcel BTEC Advanced Private Investigation Level 3 and then push on to the National Vocational Qualification in Investigation – NVQ Level 4 given by the best detective training school in the UK and arguably the world -The PI Academy. The thing is if I wait around for the SIA to get their finger out, I will be doing what every other Private Investigator is doing and I don’t generally follow the crowd, I lead.

Hopefully by the time, Licensing comes in, I will have the NVQ 4 and will be studying for a degree in Security Management or Investigations. It’s all part of the master plan.

You might be wondering what the difference is between the BTEC, NVQ Level 3 and NVQ Level 4 is?

The BTEC in Advanced Private Investigations is an excellent opportunity for either new investigators or the more experienced investigator to achieve an approved qualification

The NVQ 3 in Investigation is a vocational qualification with the requirement for the candidate to be assessed within the work place. It is aimed at Investigators on the front line while the NVQ 4 is aimed at Managers or Agency owners.

Full details of the courses can be obtained from the PI Academy website

Anyways, i have recently started using a new application for the iPhone called Audioboo which is an iPhone Audio Blogging App.  Essentialy a way of podcasting.  I was introduced to it by Sam Deeks from MukaiMedia (thanks Sam).

It’s very useful when you don’t have a facility to write a webblog as I am often out there in the back of a van, I can just do an audioboo instead.

e-Media @WAPI

In my career as a professional thief catcher, I have detained between 5 and 10 shoplifters a day, over 17 years that works out at more than 20,000 shoplifters caught stealing in various retail stores. As you can imagine, I consider myself a bit of an expert on shoplifter techniques.

Most people have no idea of the staggering scale of shoplifting which costs retailers and ultimately consumers billions of pounds every year. The general public largely consider shoplifting a trivial and ‘victimless’ crime. Before I get to my list, I think we need to talk about the Law on Shoplifting.

So what is shoplifting? Well you won’t find it on the statute books under that term. Shoplifting is Theft!  Under the Theft Act 1968, Theft is defined as “A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it; and

‘thief’ and ‘steal’ shall be construed accordingly.”

What does that mean? I hear you ask…Well there are 5 areas that have to be proved before a person can detain another for theft;

1 Is the act dishonest? i.e. was there concealment?
2 Was there appropriation? ie did the thief use the property as if it were his?
3 Is it property?
4 Does it belong to another?
5 Was there an intention to permanently deprive the owner of it ie not just borrow

Well now you can see the problem in catching them, you have to have seen the entire sequence from start to finish of the thief entering the store, approaching the item, concealing the item, leaving the store and making no attempt to pay for the item.

Shoplifter or Customer?

There are some very funny articles on the web on the subject of stealing and the rationalisations of the theives who do it. My favourite is “The Art of Shoplifting”, I have to share a quote from that esteemed treatise, Golden rule one, “NEVER STEAL FROM SOMEBODY WHO COULD CONCEIVABLY BE A COMRADE”. In fact that article is full of little golden nuggets.

But I digress, on to the top 7 habits of a highly successful shoplifter;

1 – Act completely normal. Most people get caught because of their body language, looking around to see who is watching you is not normal behavior.

2 – Dress according to the environment. Don’t wear long coats in summer or look like most people’s idea of a LA gangster.

3 – Try to be “in and out”, don’t hang around but at the same time don’t be in a hurry either.

4 – If you use props, make sure they are new. Using a tired old and crinkly shopping bag is a giveaway.

5 – Don’t worry about CCTV, it can’t jump of the wall and run after you. 9 times out of 10 no one is watching anyway.

6 – Be confident.

7 – Always remember that you WILL eventually get caught so be prepared for that eventuality.

That’s it but I bet you were expecting me to explain shoplifting techniques, weren’t you? Well that is for the next article.

In truth, very little will deter determined shoplifters. CCTV is redundant when not backed up by CCTV operators in conjuction with Store Detectives (SD’s) or guards. Few stores have security guards and staffing levels are low. Those shoplifters who are unlucky enough to be caught will only return to shoplifting the next day to pay off their fine.

Ultimately, all you can do is to try and make it harder for them. Look out for my next article of that very subject.

Legally you have an obligation to your customers to keep their data secure. In point 7 of the Data Protection Principles it states, “Appropriate technical and organisational measures shall be taken against unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to, personal data.” Data encryption is the most secure method of adhering to this requirement. One way to adhere to this policy is to hire an encryption service which can not only encrypt your data, but provide a record as to when and what was done.

Many UK financial companies are looking toward using external encryption services companies as the service provides a layer of monitoring and may prevent costly fines. Financial organizations are required by the FSA to have a strict policy regarding the use of laptops and encryption in place and monitored on a periodic basis. Failure to comply can result in fines to the company ranging in the millions of GBP. In June 2008, the Financial Services Authority issued its first fine to a company for poor data protection practices. Merchant Securities Group was fined £77,000 for having poor security controls and not protecting client details properly.

Recently HSBC was fined almost GBP3.2 million for a data breach. There is no limit to the amount of the fine if included in a Crown Court Judgment. In April 2010 the privacy regulator for the Information Commissioner will be granted a host of new powers relating to the fines it can issue. If the Commissioner’s Office learns of laptops that have been lost or stolen and not adequately protected with suitable encryption, the Commissioner’s Office now will be able levy fines. Reports suggest the fine to HSBC would have been substantially less if encryption services had been employed.
Customers are important to your business. Their identity data is important to them. Not protecting their information will not only damage your business and your customer’s faith in you, but the fines can be staggering. You can continue to do business the way you’ve always done it and take the risk. Or you can play it safe by using encryption services to secure your customers data.

Author Stuart Gilbertson of www.considerit.co.uk

Our client is not actually in her bedroom and the woman he sees behind the blinds is “my decoy” a female agent recruited especially for the job because of her uncanny likeness to Anna, The Operation was simply to lure him out of his car to obtain a good clear photograph. Anna meanwhile in another room at the back of the house away from his prying eyes.

Anna is a young thirty something professional mother who married Gregg in a grand church ceremony eight years previously. Soon after they were married he became obsessively jealous and controlling which spurned him to turn violent and now Gregg can’t accept it’s over. Anna is one of the 1.2 million women who are being stalked each year.

In March 2004, the Home office published a study called “Domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking: The “British Crime Survey” found that Eight per cent (8%) of women and six per cent (6%) of men were subject to stalking during 2003/2004. This means that over 1.2 million women and almost 900,000 men were affected. The majority of victims are ordinary men and women.

Mullen (American Psychiatric Association) defined stalking as “a constellation of behaviours involving repeated and persistent attempts to impose on another person unwanted communication and/or contact.”

Anna referred to us from one of our client Solicitors that we work for on regular occasions. The Solicitors had handled her divorce and had asked us to serve the various documents that were produced as a result. The divorce had turned acrimonious. Gregg began by persistently calling and texting her on the pretence of wanting to discuss their children. Anna then noticed his car near the school one day. She started to fear that he might snatch the children or take them abroad. Anna’s new boyfriend had the tyres slashed on his car outside her house. Anna knew it was her ex but couldn’t prove it and the police could do nothing without evidence.

Anna’s solicitors immediately obtained a Non-Molestation Order which prevents the Stalker from doing all the things that he has been doing. The Order has a Power of Arrest attached. Simply put, Gregg can be arrested by the police without warrant and can be imprisoned, but hard evidence that he is breaching the Orders is needed.

Not all Stalkers are the same

Gregg is of a particular type of stalker, a Rejected Stalker. According to Mullen, there are five types;

• Type A – Rejected stalkers pursue their victims in order to reverse, correct, or avenge a rejection (e.g. divorce, separation, termination).

• Type B – Resentful stalkers pursue a vendetta because of a sense of grievance against the victims – motivated mainly by the desire to frighten and distress the victim.

• Type C – Intimacy seekers seek to establish an intimate, loving relationship with their victim. To them, the victim is a long-sought-after soul mate, and they were ‘meant’ to be together.

• Type D – Incompetent suitors, despite poor social or courting skills, have a fixation, or in some cases a sense of entitlement to an intimate relationship with those who have attracted their amorous interest. Their victims are most often already in a dating relationship with someone else.

• Type E – Predatory stalkers spy on the victim in order to prepare and plan an attack – usually sexual – on the victim.

It is possible and often probable that a “Type A” can turn into a “Type E”. In this case it was decided to place a GPS Tracking device on Gregg’s car to monitor his movements near her home, children’s school and workplace using Geo-Fencing. If he enters a predefined area in the car, then the system alerts investigators and we swing our well oiled plan into action. Our objective is to gather evidence that he is breaching the terms of the Non-Molestation Order.

Methods of a Stalker

Stalkers use a variety of different methods to stalk their victims. They often use telephone calls, letters, e-mail, and graffiti, with contact by means of approaching the victim and following them to maintain surveillance. Associated behaviours include ordering goods on the victim’s behalf and initiating spurious legal actions. Threats, property damage, and assault may accompany stalking.

Anna’s stalker had done the calls, the texts and the following. All this could be proved but we couldn’t prove the criminal damage to her boyfriend’s car but neither did we need to.

Using the Internet to Stalk (Cyber-Stalking)

Since the creation of the internet, it has become easier for a stalker to maintain surveillance on their victim. Access into our lives and personal information on the internet provides rich pickings for the stalker because people have a tendency to disclose private details on **social networking sites that are completely open to search engines and therefore the stalker. Photographs of what you are up to and where you are going to be, gives the stalker unparalleled access into your life. Using these and other databases a determined person can obtain full names, dates of birth, addresses easily.

Using Private Investigators to Stalk

As a private investigators, We are fully open to the possibility that we could be used by an incompetent stalker (Type F?) to provide him with the information that he is unable to procure for himself. It is for this reason that all ethical investigators carry out due diligence into their clients where this may be a consideration.

The Law and Stalking

There is no offence in the UK which is described as “stalking”. An attempt to create such an offence by the Stalking Bill 1996 failed. It was felt that the proposed offence failed to distinguish between reasonable and unreasonable conduct.

In England and Wales, “harassment” was criminalised by the enactment of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which came into force on June 16, 1997. It makes it a criminal offence, punishable by up to six months imprisonment, to pursue a course of conduct which amounts to harassment of another on two or more occasions. The court can also issue a restraining order, which carries a maximum punishment of five years imprisonment if breached. The Act has both criminal and civil provisions to deal with stalkers and stalking behaviour.

Already before the enactment of the Act, the Malicious Communications Act 1988 and the Telecommunications Act 1984 (now the Communications Act 2003) criminalised indecent, offensive or threatening phone calls and the sending of an indecent, offensive or threatening letter, electronic communication or other article to another person.

In Scotland, provision is made under the Protection from Harassment Act against stalking but it is not a criminal offence. Victims of stalking may sue for interdict against an alleged stalker, or a non-harassment order, the breach of which is a criminal offence.

What to do about Stalking

Whilst everyone agrees that victims should never react to or communicate with the stalker; ignoring the harassment will not necessarily cause the stalker to stop. The sooner action is taken the better, be it a police warning, caution, or arrest, the more chance it has of stopping. Civil action can also be taken via a solicitor. Research has shown that those stalkers who are allowed to carry on are less likely to stop.

• Contact the police – Ask for the name of the officer in charge of the case and record the crime reference number.

• Do not respond – On no account should you agree to meet with your stalker or communicate with them in any way. It might put you in a dangerous situation and may weaken any prosecution case against your stalker simply because you have co-operated with them.

• Inform – Make friends, neighbours and colleagues aware of what is happening. They can also keep a record of sightings and suspicious incidents for you, as well as supporting and protecting you.

• Improve your personal safety – Carry a mobile phone with you as well as a personal attack alarm – it will help you feel more comfortable when you go out. Rely on your instinct. If you ever feel in imminent danger do not hesitate to call 999. Consider improvements to your home security.

Record Incidents -Record any incident you feel is suspicious including:

• Telephone calls – Do not enter into conversation with your stalker. Remain calm and try not to show any emotion. Put the handset to one side then leave for a few minutes then return and replace the handset. Record the date and time of the call as well as the details even if they were unanswered or silent calls. Try dialling 1471 for the caller’s number. Write down and save any text messages and the time they were received.

• Sightings – Record the date, time, location, a description of clothing they are wearing and anything they may be carrying and what they are doing.

• Cars – If you are aware of a particular car, record the date, time, location, make and model of car, colour, registration number and any other distinguishing features.

• Mail – If you are wary of any mail that is delivered to you either give it straight to the police without opening it, or put gloves on so you do not put your fingerprints on it.

• Computers – Save information received onto disk and print out a hard copy of relevant data. Do not delete the original. Only open emails if you know the originator and ensure your computer is secure and virus protected.

• Camera – Record on film anything you can as this will be very useful evidence of what is happening, location and frequency of the incidents.

• Diary of events – Keep a diary of what happens, how you are feeling. This will not only help you, but assist the police in their investigation.

Taking action against your Stalker

There are really three ways to effectively manage a stalker;

1. Let the police handle it
2. Take your own action
3. Combine the two

Option 3 is preferable. Always let the police know what is going on and get a crime reference number in our experience, the police rarely act unless the crime can be investigated easily.

My colleague called me as soon as the stalker entered the 3 mile perimeter that we had placed on the Geo-Fence. Our surveillance vehicle was already in place to record the evidence.

My car drifted into place about 500 meters behind the stalker. “Tango 1 to Tango 2” I whispered in the radio, “on plot and have clear view of target.” I had arrived about ten minutes after the stalker. I knew that the surveillance vehicle also had a good view of him. My colleague was operating the PTZ camera via her laptop from inside Anna’s house. I was able to monitor the conversation inside the house between my colleague and Anna via covert radio communications.

This was now the second time that we have witnessed the stalker breach the Court Order and the decision was made to put the call the police.

“Tango 3 to Tango 1, police en-route to you, ETA 30 seconds – no silent approach “blues & twos”, it had been 15 minutes since Anne called the police. My 3^rd colleague was approximately ½ a mile away; He was telling me that the police had just passed him at speed with blues and twos shattering the night silence. Hopefully they would switch them off before turning in to Anna street.

That’s an impressive response for them I was thinking. They might even arrest him on-site. I observed as the stalker turned his car ignition on but it was too late. The police were on site and had blocked his escape from the cul-de-sac and had already started to question him. One of the Police Officers went to the house where my colleague handed them a copy of the Court Order complete with the Power of Arrest.

Tango 2 was tasked to remain until the police were no longer needed at the scene. I exited my car to stretch my legs and joined Tango 3 for a quick debrief before we both proceeded to the police station where we submitted our statements.

I went home while Tango 3 went to deploy a tracking device on the car of a man who was suspected of cheating on his wife.

Jorge Salgado Reyes & Neil Sheppard

Regional Directors

Allied Detectives

Stalking the Stalker is a based on a true story from the Allied Detectives case files 2008. The names have been changed to protect Anna and her children.

**Jorge recently wrote an article entitled Privacy on Facebook which discusses how to manage privacy issues on social networking sites.

if you have ever been a victim of a stalker please fill this questionnaire in http://www.le.ac.uk/pc/aa/stalking/index.html

The instructing Solicitors had previously served the mother with a court order for contact but the mother promptly moved house and ignored the court order. They then came to me to trace them in order to serve another Order.

After some exhaustive tracing, I managed to locate the mother at her new boyfriends mothers house and even located the school that the boy attended. Although I caught glimpses of her at the address, I was never able to serve her personally. In the end the court order service via letter boxing and I did so and went on to the next job.

Last week, I received further instructions from the Solicitor to serve the mother yet again with another court order and the Judge in the case had ordered that the serve be letter boxed.

I decided that I would see if the mother still lived there (I suspected that she did not) and low and behold, she had moved yet again.

It gave me immense satisfaction to serve her personally this time as well as the letter box serve. The mothers face was a picture to behold because she couldn’t believe that it was possible to find her.

I immediately got to work tracing and tracking.  The only information was a name, which turned out to be incorrect or perhaps false, an email address and a couple of mobile numbers.

After looking for the address based on the name without success, I started to play around with the mobile numbers. Of course, I rang them first to test if they were still in existence. The old number was constantly engaged and the new one went unanswered.

I had explained to the client that obtaining an address from the mobile number is usually illegal due to the Data Protection Act. However the number had been published on a website which had an address as well. From that I was able to cross reference that address to my databases and came up with the guys real name and his partners contact numbers. My client was then able to have a conversation with him.

The client then said the following nice things about me;

“I was recently let down by a freelance telemarketer who ‘disappeared’ and would not reply to calls or e-mails. Whilst he had not been paid so that I was not out of money, he had my information and I did not know who he had called on behalf of my company – which meant that either I would not follow through on commitments made to them on behalf of the company or I would end up calling them again and look really bad. Jorge Salgado-Reyes within minutes of getting what little data I had tracked him down via his partners online business allowing me to track him down via the website number. And all of this was on a Sunday, as well.

This was wonderful service. I was seriously annoyed at being treated in this way, and somewhat frustrated by my inability to do anything about it. I now know where he got with the campaign and can take over from there and have the satisfaction if being able to demonstrate that I take customer care and my business’ reputation very seriously.

So thank you Allied Detectives!”
__________________
Lisette
HireScores.com – rating recruitment
HireScoresForum
mlh global hr consulting

My new client explained that her mother had died a couple of years ago and that her father was often confused and did not remember that she had died. My client believed that her father may have made his way back to his old house in Redhill in his car.

The client requested that I drive to Redhill and locate her father while they would be making their way from Devon but that it would take them at least 3 hours to get there.

After agreeing a price I arrived at her father’s old house in 20 minutes. The current occupants informed me that an old man had knocked on the door but they had turned him away.

I began driving and checking every pub in the area. After 20 minutes of this, the client rang me to tell me that her father had rung her mobile from a BT phone box but that she did not get the number.

After a bit of research with BT, who it seemed had taken most of the public phone boxes out of the area, i discovered that there were only two left in that area.

Naturally i eventually found the old man at the second phone box and waited with him for approximately 2 hours until the my client and her brother arrived.

I went home after a job well done.

Retailers are losing billions every year through theft, according to figures from the British Retail Consortium and about a third of this sum is attributed to dishonest staff.

As a result, retail companies are turning their attentions to internal problems, says Allied Detectives’ Senior Corporate Investigator Jorge Salgado-Reyes. A starting point is for companies to improve their vetting procedures during recruitment” he says. “The reality is that every major retailer has internal theft problems”.

New opportunities for staff to commit internal theft have emerged, thanks to the nature of modern retailing. For example, credit card technology gives internal scammers the ability to perform a refund transaction on their own or a friends credit card in‐store and later share the spoils. There is no physical movement of product or cash. And dishonest staff who, according to research, tend to be part‐time workers or those employed with a company for less than 12 months are ‐ searching out new ways of helping themselves. “I have investigated staff who have clocked up loyalty points on their own loyalty cards, when processing a customer’s purchases,” says Jorge Salgado-Reyes.

Retail fraud investigation specialist Jorge Salgado-Reyes says retailers must understand where such problems take place in their store.

“Technological solutions that link CCTV with EPOS or enable data mining of EPOS information to alert managers to till fraud are more common. For example, if a member of staff is carrying out an unusual number of refunds, but the CCTV shows no product being passed back, you can take action.
Similarly, clocking up fewer scans per minute than the average, managers are alerted to watch out for items being passed out for free. You might then use CCTV to investigate further.”

Jorge Salgado-Reyes urges retailers to take a holistic approach to investigations, looking beyond traditional shrinkage, because it often unearths wider operational problems that, when rectified, can save the company significant sums. “Profits may be down, but shrinkage is a constant, so losses take a larger percentage off the bottom line,” he says.

“Implanting a culture of zero tolerance needs to start with company‐wide adherence to robust company procedures,” he says. “It’s no good having woolly guidelines about when tills should be opened and how refunds are processed and recorded, because this plants the seed of opportunity in the minds of the staff. To minimise temptation, all staff need to be aware that procedures are set in stone and any straying from the rules will be investigated.”

Jorge Salgado-Reyes is also a strong advocate of properly supported systems of whistle‐blowing within the company. This involves staff being given an incentive to report suspected dishonest behaviour using a confidential helpline. Zero tolerance means dismissing and prosecuting dishonest employees wherever possible and communicating these actions back to the staff.