It’s estimated that nearly 35,000 people are reported missing in Australia each year. Shockingly, this works out to one person every 15 minutes at a rate of 1.7 people per 1,000 Australians (Missing Persons in Australia 2008). Due to this high number, missing person investigations are the most common type of case we at Lyonswood deal with.
But how do you find someone who can’t be found?
Well, one of the first steps we tell clients to take is by calling the police and filing a report, but sometimes this isn’t enough. Due to insufficient time allocation or resources, the police may not always be the best avenue for locating a missing person.
Which is why we’ve compiled a list on why hiring a private investigator is sometimes your best option.
1. Access to private records
People go missing for a variety of different reasons. It might be a result of mental illness, avoidance of debt, fear for safety, confusion, guilt, fear of prosecution or anything else but it’s these types of details that private eye look for when locating a missing person. You might not know it, but private investigators have access to resources the average Joe doesn’t. This includes personal databases such as birth records, tax records, voter registrations and business licenses. By being able to view these type of records you greatly increase your chance of locating a missing person.
2. Conducting Interviews
In our experience, it’s extremely beneficial to find individuals who last had contact with the missing person at hand. By talking to these subjects details may be revealed about any quarrels the missing had or any clues as to their whereabouts. By contacting everyone who the missing was in contact with, our chance of finding the missing party greatly improves. This is one of the first steps a private investigator takes when locating a missing person and is always done in a completely safe and professional manner.
3. Checking with local hospitals and medical examiners.
Sometimes medical emergencies are the explanation behind a missing persons absence and especially if they cannot be identified by hospital staff. This might be due to a concussion or similar head injuries but a private investigator may further the investigation by contacting local hospitals for recently admitted patients with unknown identities. Private Investigators know the correct method for obtaining this type of information and have exclusive contacts within the medical community.
4. Online data
You’d be surprised to learn how much information someone’s digital trail can reveal. By merely looking at facebook pages, twitter profiles, blogs or instagrams, an experienced investigator can be granted a precise geographical location of the missing person. Not only this, clues might be revealed about who the missing was recently chatting with or any suspicious groups they had joined.
If you’d like to find out more about surveillance and tracing persons click the following link:
Surveillance and Australia part 1
