investigations solo/or with others

[studentcj]

I was wondering when it comes to federal agencies, do special agents do more investigations by theirselves or with others.

[darrell]

Switch can you help him out on this one?

[Norm357]

Darrell are you working on your post count?:D

[Darin]

Yeah Darrell.....are you? Becasue I am. Norms catching me.

[Switchback]

We always work with partners.... either from our office, a task force guy, or a local. I have done some surveillances alone though... with the preface that I do not do anything without calling for someone. We often do drive-bys on the way in and on the way home.. this is very similar. Either I would call someone from my office if they are close or just snatch up a local (they are much easier to get when pressed for time).

[darrell]

Why would you think that I am workign on my post count. hahahahaha . lol

[Switchback]

I favor quality over quantity.

(barring this post, of course)
:D

[superc]

It depends. Lots of variables. Which agency is the first one. Some have policies about that. Some lack the manpower to make every interview on every case a multi person affair. Clearly the type of case makes a difference, as does the type of interview. Some times you do it alone. Sometimes you bring a small division with you. Common sense has a lot to do with it. In a perfect world every interview was pre planned and rehearsed last week and it is a team thing. For some agencies, due to workload, the personnel would be overjoyed if they knew the interview was coming an hour earlier. Is the investigator/agent providing support to a uniformed PD and investigating street crimes, or is he/she investigating a fraud crime and just verifying a signature or checking a realty title? Is he/she looking for a witness, or is he/she looking for a suspect? Are you talking about a pension fraud case in which an elderly widow is suspected of trying to hide her spouses death so her monthly stipend isn't cut, or are you talking about a crime of violence?

[mcsap]

Yeah, us locals are just a 911 call away from anything !!

[superc]

Yeah, us locals are just a 911 call away from anything !!

That can vary too. Back in the eighties no one had cell phones and whole cities might be out of radio range from dispatch/control/central. Things sometimes therefore moved a little faster when things hit the fan. One night in the early 90s we called MPD because, based on the rap sheet we had a feeling they might be interested in tagging along on a residence search (5200 block of Clay Terrace SE for those who know the area). Each responding unit got distracted by a different shooting call and therefore never arrived at our location although we could see the strobe lights of one way down the block, so after two hours we went in without them. One time on a one person investigation that was supposed to be very dull one of our agents encountered something by himself in a hallway down at the back end of East Capital, called it in by cell phone to 911 while holding several and over an hour went by before the 911 response showed up. In DC until a fairly short time ago (and I am told also in NYC) sometimes late at night on a busy night 911 doesn't answer and you just get the "all operators are busy" message.

[Switchback]

... Which agency is the first one. Some have policies about that...

The U.S. Marshals does have a policy for it, as I mentioned.

Regarding the type of cases: On my task force, we handle violent felonies almost exclusively. The Service, in general, handles all types of felony fugitive warrants. MOre often thatn not the underlying charge tends to be narcotics.

[Group9]

If we are running down an administrative type lead, like where you are serving a subpeona on an uninvolved business for some records, you might go by yourself. But, almost everything else we do, especially if you are going to be in any type of situation where things could go bad, you will have another agent with you. If you are going somewhere that is really bad, you take more.

One reason for this is that we often don't have the luxury of quick backup when we get in a jam. We usually have to dial 911 for backup help from the locals. It is often slower than talking directly to a dispatcher or other patroling units.

Just about everything we do involves a pretty serious felony and a lot of the people we deal with are somewhat prone to use violence as a first resort.


The other reason that we generally have two agents is to avoid questions of impropriety such as when you are handling large sums of money or drugs. My agency also has a myriad of policies listing situations where we are required to have another agent with us.

But, we also have the luxury of usually knowing who we are going up against, unlike a patrol officer who knows only that he may be approaching an honest citizen, a homocidal cop killer, or someone in between.

[superc]

MPD's 6D area, just north of Blaine. That area'll come down on you just for making a traffic stop off the main roads without back-up. I usually hit it just to show the colors because they've got no respect over there.

Now as to investigations, I've got four scheduled this week where I have to go knock on doors and interview/ID people for case follow-ups. One's out in rural MD and three are right down in the hood--two of them in public housing. I'll be bringing another officer with me, both for back-up and as a witness because you don't deal with people on their turf without someone else trustworthy to observe and verify what was actually said and done.

Mind you I'm just going to talk. If I was serving warrants or expecting trouble, SWAT'd be going with me and taking the lead.

You get to schedule your investigations?!? They don't just call you on a whim and say, "this has ramifications that could impact on us/or an imagined VIP, and we need you to handle it today, so cancel whatever else you had lined up for today and handle this instead.?" {envy!}