Professionalism and Ethics--Walking in the Minefield

William F. Blake, CPP, CFE

Blake and Associates, Inc.

Littleton, Colorado

           The life of the real life private investigator is unlike that portrayed on the television screen.  Many of the TV private investigators would be in jail if they worked in the real world environment.  The world of the real life investigator revolves around two key words—professionalism and ethics.  A tiny step over the line of expected conduct can be very disastrous, both for the individual and the business.  Unfortunately, many people believe that the television investigator is always an ethical and competent person—how well we know that is not correct!

            The question of ethical conduct presents the same dangers as a minefield in a military conflict—step in the wrong place and your world explodes around you.  The television PI has the luxury of working under the concepts of literary license and fiction—otherwise they could not solve a murder and robbery in an hour!  Those of us who are professional private investigators have to keep a wary eye on everything we do to ensure that our actions are within legal and ethical guidelines.  The legal guidelines can be easily researched and understood.  The ethical guidelines are not as obvious.

            According to Webster’s II New College Dictionary, ethics is a principle of right or good behavior; a system of moral principle or values; the study of the general nature of morals and specific moral choices an individual makes in relating to others; and the rules or standards of conduct that govern the conduct of a profession.

            Your personal ethics and professional business conduct are your most valuable assets.  Professionalism is the embodiment of ethical conduct. Not only are you responsible for your personal activities but those who are employed by you.  While you may not personally violate ethical standards, you will be “tarred with the same brush” if you allow an employee or subcontractor to commit an illegal or improper action.

WHAT IS PROFESSIONAL BUSINESS CONDUCT?

            Among the many attributes of the investigator’s professional reputation are his personal appearance and the appearance of his office.  Personal appearance includes the style and type of clothing worn, personal cleanliness and that of your clothing—even your hair style and length. 

            A cluttered, noisy and disorganized office is not a confidence builder for potential clients.  Additional attributes of professionalism include the language you use.  Is it proper English or does it consist of sarcasm, regional idioms, and vulgarity?  The words spoken to an individual clearly affect the reaction to your statements.  “I want to talk TO you” is an authoritarian statement implying one-way communication in the same manner you might speak to an errant child.  “I want to talk WITH you” is less threatening and implies two-way communication seeking input and information.

            The language you use and manner in which you speak to others is a key ingredient in soliciting cooperation.  The use of regional speech or dialect may not be understood by individuals from other geographical areas.  In the southern part of the United States, the word “peckerwood” is frequently used to describe a person of lesser intelligence, integrity or family status.  At the least, this is an insult to the individual being discussed and confusing to the non-Southerner.

            Another example of non-professional conduct is displaying the accouterments of a law enforcement officer and the use of police jargon such as “perp” when describing someone who may have committed an illegal act.  We are not police officers and need to use language clearly understood by the public.  We frequently use the word “subject” which implies that an individual is guilty of some illegal or improper act.  The findings of criminal activity and impropriety are within the venue of the courts and our clients, not the investigator.

            It is very unprofessional and dangerous to make a derogatory statement about any person or organization, including law enforcement agencies and other private investigators.  If you do so, it will eventually become known by the person or organization.  This will ruin your reputation and interfere with your ability to interact with these people or organizations.  How would you respond if you made a statement that Joe Jones was a crooked cop and the individual to whom you made this statement replies that Jones is his son-in-law?  Here you are—right in the middle of a minefield!

            Is Joe sitting with his feet on his desk and reading “Soldier of Fortune” magazine?  Is Suzy, the receptionist, chewing gum and filing her nails at the front desk?  Over the years, the customs of our society with respect to our interaction with others has declined.  One area of concern is the way the younger generations speak to those who are of a much earlier generation.  The formerly common habit of shaking hands is not as frequent today.  I personally dislike being addressed as “yous guys” when I’m in a public area with my family.  It’s a direct disrespectful inference that my wife is a “guy.”  Some individuals today don’t bother to stand up when talking to a person standing beside their desk.  Is there an appropriate degree of respect shown to visitors to your office?  Remember, you and your business are only as good as the personal and professional conduct and activities of your poorest employee!

            One of the quickest ways to be labeled as a “non-professional” is failing to keep commitments, not being on time for appointments or failing to return telephone calls or respond to e-mails.  Remember that to the business person, “time is money” and failing to recognize this will negatively impact your business and personal reputation.

            Another common failure in projecting a professional image is the naming of your business and your company slogan.  Your business name and slogan are indicators of your business acumen and attitudes.  You may consider yourself a very aggressive investigator and think that “mad dog” describes your aggressiveness.  Quite the contrary may be the result.  A “mad dog” is frequently considered a crazy and foolish person—a reputation of this type will not get you business.  Other names to avoid would be similar to “Texas Gumshoe”—sounds like it comes from old time detective magazines or movies; “007 Investigations” aka James Bond and Associates, complete with all the movie gimmicks and gadgets; or “Peye069” which could be interpreted as pertaining to a sex act.

            An area of professionalism and ethical conduct is the content and quality of your written report.  Your client is not an observer to your acquisition of information and must rely on your written report of your actions.  It is extremely important to ensure that your report is comprehensive, unbiased, non-judgmental and a thorough and impartial representation of the facts.  Hearsay and unsubstantiated information should not be included in the report unless the information is identified as such.  The appearance of your report is another indicator of professionalism.  Is your report on ordinary 20-pound copy paper or is it on 24-pound linen paper?    Does your report contain typing errors or obvious corrections? Is your report organized in a logical sequence to facilitate understanding? Remember, appearance is important.

POTENTIAL ETHICAL MINEFIELDS

            Ethical dilemmas come in many formats, some obvious and some more subtle, but the resulting actions should always be to “avoid evil and the appearance of evil.”

            The following scenarios represent problems that could arise in your business activities.  For each of the following, answers to three questions are important:

1.         Is there an ethical issue and if so, what is it?

2.         What could have been done to prevent such a situation?

3.         How would you handle the ethical issue(s)?

A.        You have been retained by Joe Smith, a small business man in Denver, CO, who has agreed to pay your hourly rate and reasonable and necessary expenses.  Joe wants to meet you in Las Vegas, NV and you decide to stay in the Presidential Suite of the Desert Hotel and Casino.

The ethical question is whether or not the use of the Presidential Suite can be considered “reasonable and necessary.”  As a small business man, your client probably would not use the suite for his own purposes because of the cost.  A question to be considered is “Why does Joe want to meet me in Las Vegas instead of at his business location in Denver?”  This type of problem can be eliminated by setting a clear standard for the type and cost of hotel facilities to be utilized when in a travel status.  A good criterion is to refer to the U.S. Government per diem rates.

B.        Your client has agreed to meet with you in a distant city and pay your travel, hotel, rental car and other reasonable expenses.  The day of your meeting is extremely hot and your rental car will be too hot and not cool off quick enough so you take a taxi to the meeting location and charge the taxi fare to your client.

This is obviously an expense that should not be charged to your client.  If you chose to use transportation other than the authorized rental vehicle, it should be a personal expense and not one chargeable to the client.  If charged to the client, it would actually be a duplicate transportation cost.

C.        You receive a telephone call from Bill Smith, a member of the Board of Directors of the Ajax Corporation, one of your better clients.  Smith asks you to conduct a surveillance of Mary Jones to determine how, where and with whom she spends her non-working hours.  He tells you Ms. Jones is not married and that you should bill the Ajax Corporation but send the invoice to Smith’s residence address.  He also asks you not to discuss the matter with any other corporate employees.

An obvious question is the real intent of Mr. Smith’s request—is it a personal or business request?  If it is a business request, why does he want you to send your invoice to his residence address?  I would ask him to submit his detailed request to you on company letterhead stationery.  I would also ask him the purpose of the request—ostensibly to be better prepared to complete your investigation.  Be careful, this could land you in court at a later date, either as a defendant or a plaintiff’s witness against Mr. Smith.

D.        You are working as an investigator for a plaintiff’s attorney who has initiated civil litigation against the Acme Corporation, the defendant.  You receive a telephone call from an attorney representing the Acme Corporation against your attorney’s plaintiff.  The Acme attorney states he would like to meet you for dinner at an exclusive club to discuss the allegations of the plaintiff.

You should be very suspicious of any request from an opposing attorney to meet without all attorneys being present.  This could easily be an attempt to mitigate your investigative action by paying for an expensive meal at an exclusive club.  This could also be a violation of the attorney’s code of ethics.  Never discuss anything with an opposing attorney without permission of all attorneys involved in the matter.

E.         You have been contacted by the Human Resources Manager of the Alpha Corporation who tells you that Bill Richards is a trouble maker within the company because he is trying to unionize the employees.  The HR Manager asks you to get any information possible to discredit Richards.

This is a situation where I would be very wary of the true intent of the request.  Interfering with unionizing a business is also a violation of federal law.  It appears that the HR Manager wants to use you to gather information and pass the responsibility for illegal conduct to you at a later date.  I would refuse such a request because of the potential law violation.

F.         During the course of another investigation for the Ajax Corporation, you determine that Sally Doe, the Accounts Payable Manager of a subordinate company of Ajax is the owner of an auto parts store where the Ajax Corporation buys large quantities of auto parts during the year.

The question here is whether or not you notify Ajax Corporation of possible improper actions and/or financial benefits accruing to Ms. Doe.  If you have been employed by Ajax to review the activities of all corporate units for improper activities or conflicts of interest, being aware of this information would obligate you to communicate it to the corporate headquarters for appropriate action.  Another question would be how did you become aware of this information?  Was it received directly from a corporate headquarters employee or from inquiries at the subordinate levels?  Even if you were not tasked to review the operations of subordinate units, the fact that you got the information from a headquarters employee during the course of your tasked inquiries would make it appropriate to report the information to your headquarters contact.

G.        You are being paid for personal vehicle travel at a given rate per mile.  As you are leaving for work, your wife asks you to drop her off at the local mall where they are having a “fabulous” sale.

The question here is does the side trip to the mall increase the mileage charge to your client?  If you decide to charge your client for the “diversion mileage,” it would be a fraudulent charge.  If you did not deviate from your normal travel route, there would be no problem as there should be no additional mileage charges.

H.        You are on an extended trip for your client to another city.  It is Saturday and you want something to read to help pass the time.  You go to the local news store and purchase the Washington Post, Boston Globe, New York Times, and the Seattle Times at a total cost of $10.00 and charge the expense to your client.

This would be a questionable and probably unethical charge to your client unless you can demonstrate an investigative need to obtain information from national newspapers.  This is probably a personal expense.  Any action or expense that you would not take at your residence/office location should not be charged to the client because you are out of town.

I.          You have assigned a single investigative task to a private investigator in Detroit, MI.  He is to contact the Peace Officers Standards and Training Division of the Michigan State Police in East Lansing, MI and determine if an individual, currently assigned to a U.S. Army unit on the East Coast, was a former certified police officer in that state.  You subsequently receive an invoice for eight hours of travel time from Detroit to East Lansing and return as well as four investigative hours for contacting a local U.S. Army CID unit to review the subject’s military records.

There are several problems in this situation.  You assigned a single task to the Detroit investigator and he, without permission, performed additional tasks.  The trip from Detroit to East Lansing is obviously inflated.  Prior to assigning tasks to another investigator, you should determine the approximate costs as a part of normal case financial management.  The one-way mileage from Detroit to East Lansing is approximately 90 miles with a travel time via Interstate highway of 1.5 hours.  This is an overcharge of approximately four hours.  The trip to visit his friend at the local U.S. Army CID office was a sham.  Military personnel records would not be at, or accessible from, a CID office in Michigan, particularly when the individual was assigned to an East Coast unit.  In all, this was an inflated invoice for about four hours of alleged investigative effort.

J.          You are on an extended business trip where your client is paying your expenses.  You are tired of watching television as your only entertainment and decide to go to the hotel bar for a “couple of drinks.”  While in the bar, you order a couple of bottles of vintage wine that sell for $75.00 a bottle, which you share with a young lady you met in the bar.

This is obviously an unethical and improper expense without prior approval of your client.  Even if the event was related to your investigation, the cost of the wine is exorbitant, when a lesser value bottle of wine would serve the purpose.  This appears to be a case of questionable actions on the part of the investigator.

K.        You are conducting an investigation in Nevada and are observed by one of your hometown neighbors entering the Mustang Ranch outside of Podunk, NV.

Based on the above information, it cannot be determined if this is ethical or unethical conduct.  If the investigator went to the Mustang Ranch for a legitimate investigative reason, there is no problem.  If the investigator went to the Mustang Ranch for personal reasons, it is a goldmine for criticism.  Investigators must avoid evil and the appearance of evil.

SUMMARY

            If you are a truly professional private investigator, you will inherently have a good code of ethics.  Without ethics, you will never be a professional investigator.  Your personal ethics and professional business conduct are your most valuable assets.  Professionalism is the embodiment of ethical conduct. Not only are you responsible for your personal activities but those who are employed by you.  While you may not personally violate ethical standards, you will be “tarred with the same brush” if you allow an employee or subcontractor to commit an illegal or improper action.

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Mr. Blake is a retired United States Army Criminal Investigation Command Special Agent and has over 50 years experience as a military, corporate and private investigator.  He is a member of Intellenet.

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