Angela came to me one day looking to find her real parents. She had been raised in Ethiopia and was adopted by Canadian Missionaries. She loved her family but wanted to know more about the family she came from and the Ethiopia culture.  

This care was a bit harder to crack, because many hospitals in rural Ethiopia do not keep birth records. I tried to do some ancestry search, but it was much harder. The first thing I decided to do was interview Angela’s parents. They had some adoption records for a hospital in Addis-Abba but it was a blind adoption and even they didn’t know who the family was. So, I decided it was time to go Ethiopia, and I took Angela and a translator with me.  

We started at the hospital who told us they can’t release any names but that many babies at that time were referred to them by an orphan agency started by an American woman. The agency had long went under, but the woman still loved in that village. We set out there to meet her and see if she remembered Angela.  

It was a miracle, because she did! She said that Angela’s parents were so upset about giving her up that they thought about the decision, meeting with her for weeks, before they ultimately realized it was the best thing to do. See, Angela’s mother died during childbirth, leaving just a young father to take care of her. He wasn’t sure if he could do it, but his family was so upset at him for thinking that. He knew his family would help him raise the young girl, but he wanted to give her the best life ever, so he decided to give her up to the Canadian couple. He knew they would give her the life that he couldn’t.  

Angela was in tears at this point and wanted to know where to find her father. The old woman couldn’t remember his name but knew his village. So, we went there and started asking around. The villagers knew right away who we were talking about and took us to meet him. He broke down as soon as he saw her. It was his child.  

I left Angela behind so she could reconnect with family and get to know them better. She is now in daily contact with her Ethiopian family and visits them often. 

An old wealthy widow hired me to find some pieces of expensive jewelry that went missing. Her husband had bought them for her shortly before she died, and classic in classic rich person fashion, she suspected that the housekeeper took them.  

So, I came into her house for a few days and set up some cameras around some very expensive earrings that I had the old woman leave out. The housekeeper, picked them up, cleaned them, and then set the back down. No issues.  

I forwarded the film to the end and watch as they do get stolen, by the woman’s poodle! The dog must be accustomed to jeweled chew toys because she took those earrings back to her dog house where all the other jewelry was!

Marcus was a hardworking Microgreens Farmer in San Francisco that sold his produce at several farmer’s markets throughout the city. People loved his greens so much that they would travel all over the city to get them. Marcus was not the only Microgreens person around, and it’s actually pretty easy to start your own business, which is how Marcus go into Microgreens after all. However, Marcus was the best, until his plants started weltering and making people sick.  

Marcus hadn’t changed anything about his operation, rather he was sticking to his tried and true methods, so he was just as surprised as his customers when his crops weren’t coming out the way he expected. He had some farming friends come in and check out what was going on, and they ran some samples on his soil, and it turns out that his crops had been poisoned. Someone had tampered with his soil.  

He was livid, rightfully so, and came to me for help. I decided to first take stock of who had access to his house, where he grew the Microgreens. Marcus lives alone and the only person that ever comes to visit is his sister, Kara. We both knew that she couldn’t have done it, so someone must have got something into his soil when he was at a farmer’s market and brought samples along to show his customers.  

From there, the case was easy. Marcus has several competitors, but none more so than Quinn, another Microgreens Farmer who started before Marcus and lost many of his customers when Marcus started up shop. Quinn was furious with Marcus and wanted to get him back.  

I knew that it had to be Quinn, so we decided to set up some cameras and have Marcus leave his soil attended at the next market. Sure enough, when he left, Quinn dumped rat poison into the soil. We had it all on camera so he couldn’t deny it. Marcus felt bad about stealing his customers, though, and decided not to press chargers. The two are now working together on expanding their farms! 

Sometimes, big corporations hire me to find out how they customers are taking advantage of them. It’s always interesting how these companies, in return, try to squeeze every penny out of the people they serve. Anyway.  

A big health insurance company came to me about a woman who recently had had hip surgery. They believed that she was asking for more physical therapy appoints that she actually needed, according to their estimates. They asked me to do some digging to see how she is actually doing and prove she doesn’t need the appointments. I think they were thinking that the woman was actually doing really well, running marathons, and using the PT appointments to get back into shape.  

I schedule some appointments myself at the same clinic and had to go a few times before I actually saw the woman. Six months after her surgery, she was still on crutches. As it turns out, a freak bus accident, reinjured her hip and she had to have more PT to get back to health.  

In this case the insurance company was wrong about suspected fraud and needed to keep paying the woman.

When you get into the PI business, you expect to have many cases about cheating lovers, but one of my first cases, was one that I didn’t expect coming.  

Denice’s boyfriend, Harold, went missing one night after a lovely date. The two had met about three months prior on Match.com and really hit it off. Denice really liked Harold, and she thought he liked her back as well.  

The biggest problem in their relationship, though, is timing. Denice is a physical therapist and often works evenings. She also doesn’t get much time off around the holidays because their businesses is always open. Harold is a banking consultant and travels around the country to help businesses learn new software. They both have active lifestyles and take trips with friends on the weekends. Although they had been seeing each other for a few months, they had only met up a handful of times. But, they did talk every week.  

Denice and Harold had planned to hang out one Friday evening, when Denice had hoped to bring up the “what is this” conversation, but she got a text from Harold the night before saying that his parents decided to sell their house randomly, and he needs to go down to Florida the next night to help them. She was disappointed but understood. She told him to text her while down there, and he agreed.  

Denice figured he would be back after a few days, but two weeks passed, and Harold was still down there. “Things came up,” he said. She was rightly furious, and after a bottle of merlot, texted him, “well, I guess I won’t ever see you again.” As you can imagine, Harold did not like this, and he told Denice she was not being understanding. He didn’t return any of text messages or phone calls after that.  

Not sure what to do, Denice came to me to see if we could locate him and what happened. I checked Harold’s social media accounts, and they did indicate that he was in Florida two weeks ago, but there wasn’t anything since. I decided to see if I could call his office, pretend that I was a bank looking for some help, and as soon as I called his work number, Harold answered. I pretended to be the banker and asked if he could do a meeting in the city where he and Denice lived, and he said he could meet me that afternoon! He was not in Florida.  

I brought Denice with me to the meeting, and Harold was not at all happy to see her. He said he had actually never gone to Florida and the photos he posted were a rouse to distract Denice, when she would inevitable come searching for him on social media. He said that he lost interest in her and didn’t know how to tell her. To this, Denice through a glass of water in his face and walked out!