Manhattan, NY is probably the most challenging location in the country for surveillance. For this reason alone, I wasn’t excited about our case for a prominent Houston divorce attorney. His client was the wife in a divorce case.
Her husband was the wealthy owner of a major food processing company in the U.S. He was going to New York on business, and his wife thought there might be some hanky-panky going on up there. We knew he would be staying at a friend’s townhouse, and I was able to get a hotel room nearby. A female investigator accompanied me on the assignment.
We could have used four or five investigators for this difficult surveillance. Manhattan is particularly challenging because of traffic and a sea of taxi cabs. Of course, our Subject chose to use cabs instead of his own car, making it a really difficult deal to follow him around.
We would have to hang out around the townhome so that we could see him walking out, as he could grab a cab right in front and be gone in an instant, disappearing into that sea of cabs.
The only way to keep up was to note the taxi number and constantly keep it in view. It was made more challenging by the way they drive in Manhattan. Cab drivers are particularly aggressive.
My investigator was driving and we were having trouble keeping up with the cab. We were falling further and further behind. It was becoming impossible to read the cab number, so desperation set in. I decided to bail out and continue on foot. I told my investigator I would call her later to pick me up.
I’m glad I was working out regularly and was in pretty good shape. I had to run 32 blocks to keep that cab in sight! We ended up in Penn Central Station. The Subject purchased a train ticket, so I bought one as well on the same train. The difference was he knew where he was getting off while I had to buy a ticket all the way through to the final stop.
I kept the Subject in sight and we ended up getting off the train at Princeton University in New Jersey! There I was hanging out surveilling the Subject on campus, trying not to look like a stalker and attracting the attention of campus security.
I thought I’d hit the motherlode when I saw the Subject hanging out with an attractive young coed. This would be a juicy photo tidbit in the divorce. At least that’s what I thought until a little PI work determined that she was his niece.
This ended the need to follow him around anymore, so I called my investigator and told her to pick me up at Princeton U. Of course, what I heard was “Where the hell is Princeton University?” She was in our hotel in Manhattan, and I had to tell her that she needed to drive to New Jersey, about 2 hours. Of course, that was New Yorker hours, as it took her four-and-a-half!
Education in More Ways than One
One of the evenings when my investigator and I were returning to the hotel, I went in first. I glanced back and saw an unkempt male assault my investigator, knocking her down and running with her purse. I made sure she was OK and got her to her room. I told her I was going to the Police Department to report the mugging.
But, instead I left the hotel and started looking for the a..hole, oops, perpetrator, and found him two blocks away. Speed of response is the key, as any time I spent at the police department would have let him get completely away.
He saw me coming and took off running. I chased him into an all-night clinic full of people waiting to see a doctor. They say that criminals aren’t very smart. I normally agree, as I’ve seen some really elaborate criminal schemes.
But, in this case, he sat down amongst the group of patients and grinned at me as if I couldn’t do a thing about it. He was assuming I was someone else I guess. I walked up to him, hit him in the face and knocked him to the floor. I informed everyone in the room that he had assaulted my friend and stole her purse.
I searched his pockets, and there was her cash and her credit cards. It didn’t take a lot more convincing to get him to tell me where her purse was, in a dumpster nearby. I found it and returned it to her. I left him in the clinic so he could get his face fixed.
I told my investigator that my report to the police had resulted in the return of her purse. It’s hard to get away with lying when your knuckles are bleeding. I knew I should have taken care of that! She knew what had happened, but was happy to have her stuff back.
We left New York after 6 days of work and a successful investigation. Sometimes success isn’t catching the Subject in something bad. Instead, you can validate their legal or moral behavior.
Manhattan surveillance is tough, even when you don’t have to fight off muggers. We did our job though, and were exhausted when we returned to Houston.