Tyson Investigative Services, Inc.
Client Advice Sheet –
Surveillance
In seeking to provide our clients with the most effective and cost efficient professional service available, we look or adherence to the following general guidelines to both minimize the potential for problems and maximize the potential for success:
1. It is both appropriate and expected that the limits of a surveillance project will be
clearly defined.
a. We should know, in advance, how much time to expend on a case. It is recommended that as least two days of surveillance be executed on the average file.
b. Files with high exposure may justify several more days of surveillance.
c. We seek confirmation of instructions in writing.
2. A visual surveillance presentation provides the best form of supportive and corroborative evidence an investigator can produce in corroborative support of their statement or testimony.
3. The greater the advanced notice of an assignment, the greater the potential for success. In the case of emergency surveillance deployment, our skills are fully dedicated and focused for the benefit of the clients, but the results may be achieved more by default than by design under such emergent circumstances. Remember also, the more proximate a case to a trial date, the more likely the claimant will be inactive.
4. We find that most of our clients fully understand the difficulties and complexities to be associated with performing surveillance assignments.
a. Claimants are and can remain inactive.
b. Due to the quality of issued instructions and/or the absence of complete identification information, the incorrect person may inadvertently be concentrated upon.
c. Traffic congestion and like demographics, especially and typically in the Northeast, can combine to frustrate the most evolved professional surveillance tactics.
d. In densely populated areas, we recommend the use of two investigators working in
tandem with each other in separate vehicles.
5. Although appreciating the motivation behind the practice, ‘partial-day’ surveillance operations should be avoided whenever possible. Some clients request a limited commitment in the morning, with instructions to return another day if the subject is “inactive.” This questionable strategy may defeat the potential for success when, to remain assigned over a longer period, may serve to better determine, as quickly as possible, any established schedule and routine of a claimant.
6. The more information able to be provided regarding the background of a claimant, i.e. anticipated or suspected work routines, weekend activities, physical description, extent of alleged disability, vehicles possessed, et-cetera, the better informed our personnel for operational deployment. Such finite data is well received by our investigators and greatly assists in our pre-surveillance and actual operational strategies, more especially when combined with accurately provided claimant identification essentials. A photograph and/or previous investigative report is, by definition, invaluable to our further endeavors on behalf of our clients.
7. A “Surveillance” per-se, is an intense form of investigative discipline and involves the necessity of physically scrutinizing a subject to determine their activities, without compromise or detection, and with the intention of providing court-presentable, direct visual evidence of the facts observed, this being the most dramatic form of evidence possible.
8. An “Activities Check” or “Pre-Surveillance Report” refers to the advanced preliminary process of gathering information and developing intelligence relative to a subject’s location and current activities. This procedure is generally developed through database and non-compromising interview techniques, conducted and acquired independently of contact with the subject of inquiry.
9. A visual surveillance presentation provides the best form of supportive and corroborative evidence an investigator can produce in corroborative support of their statement or testimony.
Essential Information Required to Facilitate Maximum Benefit
In presenting a set of circumstances for surveillance works, we anticipate our clients will provide the following minimally-essential level of information:
Claimant’s Name:
Correct spelling (Are there any other variations of the spelling in the file?)
Middle Initial or Name Names presented in correct order (especially when dealing with foreign names)
Claimant’s Address:
Complete postal address (i.e.: zip code, apartment number, building, floor, etc.)
Independent verification of address (By means of previous investigation, returned mail, etc.)
Essential in determining the currency and accuracy of information supplied.
Description:
Gender Specification: Male or Female (sometimes a name does not immediately
differentiate this essential identification facet)
Height
Weight
Ethnicity
Hair: color, style and length
Distinguishing characteristics: tattoos, mustache, glasses, etc. (all very important factors in the accurate identification of the correct individual)
Date of Birth
Social Security Number
Dependants
Miscellaneous:
Photographs – again, and subject to currency, invaluable in terms of positive identification
Motor Vehicles – a known vehicle and/or registration plate number is of tremendous
potential value to the field investigators