7. Paranoid Rich Men Will Pay For Anything
Former PI here. Most cases I worked on were for large litigation firms and finance institutions (fraud, embezzlement, insider trading, etc). But we would get the occasional eccentric millionaire with strange requests. One guy hated his brother and hired us a number of times to look into him regarding different matters. I personally had to investigate whether his brother was improperly using his title of ambassador or former ambassador. Apparently, there are many laws about this. Another hedge fund manager hired us to look into him (he was investigating himself) to see what kind of information is out there that could be used to hold him or his family ransom. This same guy had previously hired my firm to go through porn sites after his girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend claimed she was a porn star.
8. Chasing Down A Dead Man
I’m a PI (among other things.)
I haven’t had any bizarre tasks, though I have had some interesting situations, and I’ve performed surveillance on cheating spouses as well as factual worker’s compensation and public liability matters.
One matter which really made an impression on me was where a person had a fatal vehicle incident and a claim was made that it was a workplace injury. I don’t know what on earth happened with this claim but it was five years before the insurer gave it to me.
There were some questions about it – the person making the claim alleged to be the worker’s wife, though work colleagues did not know her, and also the incident was almost 200km from the workplace.
When I spoke to former colleagues a lot of them struggled to remember him. This really was so sad. It left a deep impression on me that what are we once we are dead if we are not even memories.
I did, however, learn he stayed at a caravan park during the working week. I called that place but the owner said it had changed hands and he didn’t know the guy, he didn’t have any old records, and he didn’t know where the former owner was. He did remember the former owner’s name however.
I called everyone in the phone book for the state with that name. I finally got my man, and he remembered the deceased vividly … along with his wife and son. It was tremendous! I learned the guy would stay near the workplace during the week and travel back home, to a remote town, for weekends.
I drove all the way to that town but couldn’t find the wife. She wasn’t at any address I had, nor did she answer her phone. I got petrol and asked at the counter if they knew the family, and they said it might be so-and-so and directed me to a house. I went there, turned out to be the wife’s parents, they called the daughter, she arrived and both mother and daughter had a big cry while showing me all their photographs of the guy. It was very moving, and I was so relieved to have real evidence the guy ever actually existed after how his co-workers were finding it hard to remember him.
The story was very sad; he died on the way to work on a Monday morning. Normally he would travel to the caravan on a Friday night but this particular weekend was mother’s day. He stayed Sunday night and traveled Monday, early in the morning, ran off the road and passed away :(
I was able to determine the lady was genuinely his wife, that he was on his way to the workplace, that it was his regular route to work, and so on. I supplied this to the insurer. I never – well, rarely ever – hear what happens to a matter so I only hope it was finally settled.
