Cindy wanted a mailbox at the street with a flowering vine, so Jim was out at the street’s edge digging out the hard Indiana ground with a spade. In the next moment, their lives changed.

A car came around the corner and hit Jim, knocking him off his feet and landing him on the driveway, where he hit his head on the concrete. Since the accident, Jim cannot work and the medical bills have begun to pile up.

The driver of the car acknowledges he hit Jim. There was no dispute there.

So why were we hired by the attorney?

The driver of the car was an architect. He owned three homes and his own firm. However, the interrogatories show that he had no assets available to pay the judgment awarded to Jim in a civil lawsuit. The attorney believes that the architect has purposely hidden financial assets to prevent having to pay the judgment.

It was our job to find out if the attorney was correct.

We began a financial asset research investigation. Through extensive research, we found what the attorney expected. The architect had taken out several home equity loans against the properties dated after the accident. Searching for hidden bank accounts and stock accounts, we uncovered the cash from the loans. We generated a report and have turned it over to the attorney.

A thorough search for financial assets often requires the skills and knowledge of a professional investigator. That’s why attorneys contact us often. We know how to get the honest results.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators

-B. McGinley, Director of Operations, International Investigators

One of the most common steps is the hiding of assets. If the decision to divorce has been in the works for some time, the spouse initiating the divorce has had time to hide money, stock, and other financial assets.

So when the interrogatories outlining marital assets in a divorce case are completed, those assets that have been squirreled away may not get included in the list.

There may be assets that the unsuspecting spouse has forgotten about – or may have no knowledge of in the first place.

Asset investigation is one service International Investigators provides on a regular basis. In fact, here in Indiana, there is a 6-year statute of limitation on discovery. If a search for assets uncovers hidden bank accounts within that time frame, an attorney can request that the divorce be set aside and reopened in front of the same judge. If that happens, the spouse who did not disclose the assets can be found guilty of perjury and fraud – and the other spouse could demand a portion equal to 50% or more!

It would be prudent for every spouse, no matter how surprised by a divorce, take steps to find hidden assets.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators

-B. McGinley, Director of Operations, International Investigators

With that freedom have come other issues.

One of the biggest issues is the protection of corporate assets. While workers have become mobile, they are carrying confidential corporate assets in the form of information with them on their computer and laptops. Those assets could include many things:

• actual computer hardware (theft from cars, restaurants, airports, etc.)
• client lists
• sales data
• financial data
• product research and development
• employee personnel information

Computers and laptops are routinely stolen. But the thefts of hardware are usually just to get the computer – laptop, notebook, notepad or phone – to sell it.

The thieves who want information can get more by letting the worker keep the machine and use it. They can install spyware or malware and take what they want. Computer hacking is rampant and often, just like viruses and Trojans that create havoc for the owner, spyware is inadvertently welcomed onto a computer by the user.

Because of the huge cost of lost information – particularly to competitors—many large organizations are instituting regular computer forensic examinations by computer forensics specialists.  Workers bring in their machines and examinations can detect any spyware and remove it.

In some instances, computer forensics evidence can lead to legal steps being taken and lawsuits because much is at stake.

Not all computer forensics investigators can do the computer forensics analysis and provide expert witness services like International Investigators. So if you need a specialist to detect, remove and subsequently provide expert witness testimony, call us. We can do it all.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators

He tried to do some of his own bug detection—looking under his desk, around the windows, pictures and door frames for something, but he found nothing.

So he called us.  We did a bug sweep and lo, and behold, he was correct. Inside the surge protector power strip at his feet we found a spy listening device – a bug.

We informed him about it and even showed it to him. Most clients want it OUT – NOW! But not him. Besides just eliminating the threat in his office, he knew there would be no real repercussions for the infraction – although it is highly illegal. He decided he wanted to use it.

He took measures to protect his client and the case from exposure in his office by moving his work on the case to another location. But then he began feeding the opposition false information knowing they would use it to prepare a countermeasure in court.

In the end, he used their own spy listening devices against them – and beat them in court, where it really counted.

Bug sweeps and detection has a fancy label: Technical Surveillance Countermeasures, or TSCM for short. It includes more than just bug sweeps. It can include cell and land-line phone tapping, covert audio or video surveillance and computer surveillance.

We come with the latest state-of-the-art counter surveillance equipment designed to expose every bit of spy and bug equipment that has been planted.

We want your surge protectors to do their job protecting your equipment—not exposing your confidential corporate strategies and secrets.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators

The business owner was unhappy because he had lost a key employee in his company. But worse than that, he was angry because the employee had started a competing company and the owner suspected the new company was started not only while the worker was still employed by him, but using his firm’s trade secrets, equipment and resources.

He just couldn’t prove it. At least not with enough evidence for his attorney. Of course, the employee denied it when confronted.

Through a computer forensic examination, we were able to uncover documents and communications (e-mails and reports) that brought the truth out. The employee had started his new company before leaving the old one and had taken advantage of confidential corporate information.

The owner had enough evidence afterward to satisfy his attorney who sent a cease-and-desist letter. They were considering other legal actions as well.

Not only did the computer forensics electronic discovery provide evidence, it opened the eyes of the business owner. He discovered that he didn’t have a system in place to protect his company from this situation. He knew he couldn’t prevent every issue from arising, but he was determined to make it more difficult – and evident that this was not acceptable behavior by workers.

Computer forensic investigation can cover computer data forensics recovery like in this case or spyware removal and computer hacking forensic investigation and analysis.

Computers are a reserve of information and resources for investigators when working for clients. If you need proof and it’s inside the computer, we can help you find it and get it out into the open.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators

The information they want could be many different things found in a wide variety of settings:

• What is being included in a grant application at a competing university;
• What sales strategy is being implemented to move into a new market;
• The development of a new product that would “squash” the competition;
• How a client is being defended in court;
• Whether a spouse is having an affair.

All of these bits of confidential information could have big dollar impact on another person or business, which is why some people would go to extraordinary lengths to get it. Those extraordinary lengths could include:

• Cell phone taps
• Video surveillance
• Eavesdropping devices

In short, it could be more than a cell phone tap. It could be anything that can provide them insight or information covertly.

Sometimes we get calls from professionals who “just feel something isn’t right.” They hear a comment about something that no one else should know or all of a sudden a supplier can’t provide what they need and won’t explain why.

We are hired to provide Technical Surveillance Countermeasures (TSCM) services and that “gut feeling” turns into actual cell phone tapping devices or other spy equipment like video surveillance, eavesdropping devices or computer hacking.

Although we don’t want everyone to feel paranoid, you probably have information that would be valuable to someone else. It might be to your advantage to trust those gut feelings.

If we do a TSCM sweep and find nothing, you will be able to move forward more confidently. If we find something, you may have the time you need to deal with the information leak and protect your assets and interests.

-T. Wilcox, CEO, International Investigators