By Susanna Speier
Denver Private Investigator Blogger What goes into being a 21st century Watson? Find out October 4, 2017 at a free training seminar. The seminar will be hosted by the Professional Private Investigators Association of Colorado (PPIAC) at the Denver Press Club (DPC) in Downtown Denver. When people ask me about my primary freelance gig blogging and curating social media communities for a private investigator, they sometimes get confused. "You're a private investigator?" they ask, trying to clarify. "No," I respond. I am not a private investigator. I blog for one.” I am the only member of the almost twenty person team comprising Ross Investigators who is not licensed to practice in the State of Colorado. My job as blogger and social media engagement strategist for the Denver, Colorado based PI firm does not require a license from the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies. In fact, the service I provide --writing and publishing-- is protected by the 1st amendment. Because The Denver Private Investigator Blog is a trade publication, I serve a readership consisting of private detectives, security professionals, surveillance operatives, lawyers and legal private investigators who practice in the State of Colorado and nationwide. My readers are mostly private investigators. That said, the private investigator field encompasses a wide range of professionals and expertise. My readers run asset searches, public records searches, witness interviews and help with criminal defense. They fly drones, do accident investigation, responsible party identification and provide custody case assistance. Some do security and other do surveillance. A lot of them have police, legal and military backgrounds. But back to this conversation I always end up having when someone asks what kind of freelance writing assignments I take on. Explaining how a 2017 private investigator firm functions and what PIs do still isn't necessarily sufficient for people still struggling to grasp what my daily functions are. Enter, the Sherlock and Watson metaphor. "I am Watson---not Sherlock," I finally learned to explain. "As a modern day Watson ---sans firearms training and military background-- I blog and do social media engagement for a private investigator firm." They'd get it almost immediately. " 
On Wednesday, October 4th at 6:30 p.m. fellow PPIAC members, DAC members and members of the legal, private investigator and journalism community are invited to attend my free blogging and social media for private investigators training seminar at The Denver Press Club.
Although the training runs 6:30 to 7:30 attendees are encouraged to arrive at 5:30 to try the "Gumshoe" cocktail that the club bartender, Zack is shaking up for the occasion and network in the Press Club's historic landmark building in Downtown Denver. The Denver Press Club is located in at 1330 Glenarm Place, Denver, Colorado 80204. It is the oldest press club in the country. Street parking is available and there are three public lots within a block of 13th and Glenarm. This will be the first PPIAC event hosted at the Press Club. You can RSVP here.
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 By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger The International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. is one-third theme park, one-third History Channel documentary and one third behemoth shrine to every imaginable type of gadgetry that you may or may not have imagined. On the outside It's a corner building near to the Shakespeare Theater and the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery where you enter through the gift shop. Did I mention a lot of gadgetry? Interactive elements make the museum exceptionally kid-friendly. And they seem to have all kinds of educational outreach initiatives going on. But back to the gadgetry, which isn't only hard to take in but difficult to focus on due to the shifting polyphonic soundtracks as you walk through the exhibits. And the video screens and the blinking lights. Wait...where was I? Okay, the blurbs on the plaques are robust with meticulously researched anecdotes. As the experience itself makes it difficult to focus for a long period of time it is also recommended that you plan to spend half a day there and take breaks when you need them because the collection is as extensive and comprehensive as the history of the profession, itself. It will also take you back farther than you expected it to go.  The Cold War era segment --a sizable part of the museum-- provides artifacts from Cold War history and gives detailed insights into how government operatives conceal devices to enable them to pick almost every kind of lock imaginable. Granted, KGB lock picking devices have no relevance to a private investigator who is restricted by the same laws that would restrict any other citizen from picking a lock that doesn't belong to them. But, hey, in the world of international espionage, sky's the limit. More or less...  By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger The series finale of PBS Nature's Spy in the Wild series: meet the spies just concluded on Rocky Mountain PBS and it wasn't really a spy show. For any Colorado private investigator interested in the present and future of the surveillance, however, this will be a fascinating watch. If you're an under cover operative, even better. There is, in fact, so much to be gained from observing the dynamics of the animal world you would probably have a difficult time persuading yourself not to binge watch now that the series itself has aired and is available online in its entirety. See also: Spies in Nature After spending the last few weeks watching and making observations we compiled a list of the top spy skills the show taught us for the Denver private investigator community . We assume no responsibility for you using or misusing the skills and/or strategies you are about to read.
Did we miss anything? Keep in mind you may not have the opportunity to put these things to use if you're a Denver private investigator. Even a Colorado private investigator may question how to put it all to use.
You may have trouble finding a local wolf pack, however, there are myriad prairie dogs to be found along the I25 in Aurora, Centennial, Parker, Castle Pines Castle Rock and Monument as you shuttle between the Denver zoo in Denver and the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs to see more of the animals featured in this series. Speaking of which, a giraffe at the Denver zoo just gave birth!! See the Spy in the Wild series in its entirety, now archived, for yourself onPBS Nature.  By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger Looking to head to DC late March to try to check out the cherry blossoms? There's a The National Council of Investigation and Security Services (NCISS) annual meeting at the Key Bridge Marriott in Rosslyn to justify the trip. Workshop opportunities range from cybersecurity to small businesses and how to run forensic audits using financial software and don't wait too long. Registration deadline is March 1st. Can't make that one? April kicks off with the World Association of Detectives (WAD) mid-term conference happens April 2nd through April 4th in Miami Beach, Florida. Click here to register. If you feel inclined to stay down south, the Florida Association of Licensed Investigators annual conference in Cocoa Beach runs May 4th through the 6th and even includes a pre conference event at no additional cost. If you can clone yourself an mosey up to South Carolina you can also attend the South Carolina Association of Licensed Investigators annual conference, that just so happens to be taking place simultaneously from May 4th to May 6th. Conflict check next time? Finally, while there are no drone training programs for PIs that we know of, the Poynter Institute's drone journalism may be a way to access your missing primer this spring. An interesting thing that the news media and private investigator worlds now share is the fact that both require commercial drone licenses. Sky is still the limit on the ways they can be utilized, once licensed, though.  Private Investigators can bring their stories to the Buntport Theater stage in Denver this month2/2/2017 By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger I've been wanting to figure out to help private investigators bring their stories to the stage for a long time but never had the resources to curate an actual event for the Mile Hi PI community. Just recently, however, my buddy Ron Doyle who runs The Narrators, a monthly storytelling event at Buntport Theater, approached me with an idea. Why not send a private investigator his way this month to tell a story at The Narrators "Red-Handed show"? If you are a Colorado private investigator and would like to be considered for the one remaining slot at The Narrators "Red Handed" show on Wednesday, February 15th at 8:00 p.m. at Buntport Theater, email thenarrators3000@gmail.com to find out more.  “It’s a black box theater that seats about 125-150 so it’s a sizable crowd. The audience is very welcoming. Folks are there to listen and we’ve built up this community to help built empathy and hear experiences from a wide range of voices," Doyle says. "It’s almost all 1st person narrative, memoir style.” There will be a lot of eyes on you which could feel unsettling for a private eye accustomed to hiding in the shadows, however Doyle likens the experience of telling a story on The Buntport stage to the experience of telling a story around a campfire or sharing a story at a dinner party with "not a lot of pretense" involved. "The spotlight and microphone may be intimidating but the audience will be very encouraging." Are you a woman or a minority? If so, you may be given preference. This is because, according to Ron, they get a lot of white males who approach them and would love to come tell stories. "We want a variety of voices and are looking for a variety of folks not visible in the public eye." To find out more about The Narrators you can check out the FAQ section of their website, an article bout them in Confluence Denver or their Facebook page. The show is always free for audience members and participants as the creators consider it a community service. "Facebook is wonderful for what it is. Human interaction is wonderful for what it is," Ron explains. "I think it's important people meet one another face to face as a tool for getting life experience you wouldn't get in your social circle."
By Susanna Speier,
Denver Private Investigator Blogger If you tune into Rocky Mountain PBS on February 1st (tonight) at 7:00 p.m. and Nature's state of the art, animatronic spy cameras will give you access to something that, up until now, only baby crocodiles have had access to.
Nature's five part miniseries, "Spy in the Wild," employs 30 animatronic spy cameras disguised as animals to secretly record the animal's behaviors, revealing strong, complex and very humanlike interactions and emotions. 
Want to know the cam behind the curtain? The final episode, "Meet the Spies," which airs Wednesday, March 1, 2017, explains how the concept of robotic animal spies evolved from the original Bouldercam to the Penguincam and finally to the “spycams” John Downer Productions used to make the series. While the painstaking work that goes into building the lifelike models may be discouraging, it may also inspire professional private investigators to develop the next generation of surveillance techniques.  By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger Apparently even the CIA wont carry the 2017 Secret Ops of the CIA calendar that is available through The Spy Museum gift shop. According to The Washington Post this is because the "inaugural “Secret Ops of the CIA” calendar was produced by the nephew of an agency contractor killed in the line of duty and features reproductions of the actual paintings that have hung for years in the hallways of CIA headquarters in Northern Virginia." however, "Toni Hiley, the longtime CIA museum director, said the gift shop can’t sell the calendar because “it’s not an official work of the U.S. government.” The Spy Museum gift shop is, of course, over the moon about the exclusivity as well as the fact it has the actual CIA logo on. So if you plan to order one for your office, we recommend doing it before these calendars sell out!  The 2017 Sherlock calendar is put out by the BBC and comes with photos and quotes from a whole slew of characters, not just the stern faced, deerstalker hat clad Cumberbatch. Although we don't mind the fact they chose to include a couple of those, as well. If you're a fan of BBC's Sherlock this is a calander to be adored and/or coveted.  What would a private investigator's office be, if it didn't include an homage to film noir. The Film Noir 2017 calendar we found on Etsy. It's wire bound, glossy and ships directly from New Zealand. It also provides a colorful and comprehensive sampling a a wide range of noir movies, not just the classics and if you visit the site you can choose from three different noir calendars as well as a Casablanca calendar. Casablanca, btw, will be celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2017!  The Things We've Learned From Nancy Drew calander is the brainchild of the brainy Nancy Drew fan club president, Jennifer Fischer and its Dastardly Villians calendar was also enthusiastically endorsed in our holiday gift article in PursuitMag. Take your pick of illustrations and crimes.
A recent article in Bloomberg focused on how evicted tenants were using private investigator firms to secure evidence that former landlords were running an illegal Airbnb. According to writer David M Levitt, the business finding proof that a "landlord is violating city ordinances limiting the use of private homes for short-term rentals. It’s very lucrative work nowadays in San Francisco, the city that’s come to represent America’s shortage of affordable housing." This gives private investigators a completely new role in cities like San Fransiscos, New York and also Denver, that suffer from a shortage of available housing.
"The sharing economy has provided new opportunities for grifters to game the system. So-called Airbnb squatters—like the pair of brothers who refused to leave a Palm Springs condo in the summer of 2014 after paying one month's rent—have become more common. It's enough of an issue that Airbnb has a page devoted to the topic; it warns that local laws may allow long-term guests to establish tenants' rights." "The crazy story of the professor who came to stay and wouldn't leave" published in Mother Jones by Ian Gordon followed the story of someone who hired a private investigator to research the background of a tenant she found using SabbaticalHomes.com a site for short term renters in academia. When the tenant, a tenured professor at Sarah Lawrence, failed to make timely rent payments she hired a private investigator to look into his background and indeed, he had a sustaintial history of evictions from sublets. "The new year will bring the first threat of fines under Denver’s new vacation rental rules, and there appear to be plenty of potential targets" began The Denver Post's latest update by Jon Murray. Perhaps it will bring new clients, as well.  By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger Chris Wells, a computer, cell phone and vehicle systems forensic examiner, lives in a world of ones and zeros. His many years of experience working in the cyber realm have made him invaluable to private investigators, attorneys at law and other clients. He has also spent the last few months developing a workshop that will cover the nuances of digital evidence. "My clients aren’t as savvy about the cyber world as they need to be," Wells explains. "Just stop and think about the common devices around you; in your home and in your car, that store your personal information. A client's whereabouts can be verified by their vehicle's on-board navigational system. Some don't know that if you post to Facebook on a cellphone that your entry may be internally tagged with your coordinates." Law enforcement frequently works with dedicated digital forensic teams to glean hidden infomation from digital sources. It is important for private sector PIs and attorneys to understand the basics of digital footprints. This is the reason, according to Wells, that "they don't think right off the bat, 'oh there's digital evidence here and I need to try and go get it.'" You can visit Wells' Linkedin post to learn more about his upcoming $40 digital evidence workshops. And if you're not yet sold on the value and want to sample an abbreviated version of the material he'll be presenting, Wells is doing a presentation at the January 4th PPIAC meeting. Well continued, “what I want to do in the workshop is remind people of all the devices they use on a day to day basis." For example, "at home they talk to their Amazon echo. Their nest thermostat. All these devices are storing information about people, activities, their contacts their communications (and it is) all information (that) can be made available to an investigator." Could the in-house IT person or the tech support desk at Best Buy do the trick? "The guy at Best Buy has no knowledge or bearing on legal evidence," explains Wells, "a person who does digital forensic work will always focus on what does the legal outcome need to be." By Susanna Speier Denver Private Investigator Blogger What do you get the person who has access to everything? Holiday gifts for private investigators aren't easy because --if nothing else-- you'll want to avoid the obvious. That said, we've come up with the following options for prices that range from $10.00 to $99.00.  The International Spy Museum makes an exclusive spy Gnome The International Spy Museum's, "Agent You Don't Gnome Me" ($18) Gnomes are kinda weird, kinda useless, and kinda fun. Plus, if you or someone you gnome is into the trench and sunglasses cliche but doesn't actually want to wear them, you can place the gnome as a fashion forward stand in or buy the spy gnome tree ornament --which is also available through the Spy Museum website shop. What we like about it for Coloradoans in particular is the fact you can plant it anywhere along the front range landscape and send us the photos to share with our Twitter and Facebook followers. You can even use it in your prairie garden!  Cyberspies: The Secret History of Surveillance, Hacking, and Digital Espionage by Gordon Corera is available at the Tattered Cover Bookstore in hardcover ($29.95) MP3 CD ($44.95) paperback ($16.95) and CD $118.00. Rich with historical detail and characters as well as contemporary international insights, the book will put the reader on solid ground with the present and future of cyber espionage.  Women with jobs that require them to carry a concealed firearm for self protection can express their enthusiasm for the Colorado outdoors and simultaneously misdiret a potential attacker by carrying a faux leather Gwyneth Realtree Concealed Carry Tote ($54.99). The faux leather also makes it perfect for vegetarians. Handbag contains a hidden gun holster on the inside outside, a pattern of what one may see on a typical hike through Estes Park. Available on Gun Goddess.  A spy specializing in surveillance who wants to teach his or her kids what mommy or daddy does for a living would be well served to invest in a few Santa Cam ornaments ($10+) And if they're not Etsy savvy, perhaps a friend is willing to track one down on their behalf or --if the kid insists on viewing the footage-- dress in costume to place gifts. This Etsy shop happens to be based in Denver, Colorado and offers personaliztion and multiple color as well as glitter options. A Professional Private Investigators Association of Colorado (PPIAC) apprentice membership is the perfect gift for the fledgeling PI in your life who is looking for ways to grow their career. The annual cost is only $99 and it will connect the to a savvy and supportive regional community through training, networking events and mentorship. This particular membership is designed for the PI with less than 2,000 hours of experience. For PIs with more experienc, Associate, Senior and Premiere Senior memberships are also available for $125. Have a happy and safe holiday season. Fa la la la la la la la la. |
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Susanna Speier,
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Highly experienced team of Denver private investigators serving attorneys, businesses, and individuals. Our investigation services include, but are not limited to: process of service, responsible party identification, witness locates and interviews, workplace investigations, competitive intelligence, background investigations, surveillance investigations, fidelity investigations (infidelity), cheating spouses, aerial video, & more. Ross Investigators PC, Inc. proudly offers their PI services to: Arvada, Aurora, Boulder, Broomfield, Castle Rock, Centennial, Cherry Creek, Colorado Springs, Commerce City, Denver, Englewood, Fort Collins, Glendale, Golden, Greenwood Village, Highlands Ranch, Littleton, Longmont, Louisville, Loveland, Morrison, Northglenn, Parker, Pueblo, Superior, Thornton, Washington Park, and all of Colorado.
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