Check out some similar questions!

kanicky73 · Feb 1, 2007, 10:05 AM

Ok, so here is a really strange situation that a friend of mine is dealing with. He has his house up for sale. He is also currently going through a custody dispute with an ex girlfriend. He just got notified yesterday that a private detective has obtained pictures of certain items in his house that he had in his filing cabinets at home. What this means is that a realtor (not his realtor who he has the house listed with) let the private detective into the house and allowed this detective to look around for any incriminating evidence he could find. My question is number one, did this realtor violate any laws by allowing this private detective into the house? And allowing him to look through private things and take pictures. Second question is did this private detective violate any laws by gaining access to the house without letting the homeowner know exactly why he was there? There are a couple different ways of looking at this but my friend feels that any and all pictures taken should not be admissible in court and that he should file a lawsuit against the realtor and the detective. Does my friend have a leg to stand on? Any information on any of this would be much appreciated.

Fr_Chuck · Feb 1, 2007, 11:08 AM

Sorry but most likely the private dect told the real estate agent that he may want to buy that house, and then the agent showed him or her, the dect could have been a couple man and women, so while one person keep the real estate person busy, the other one looked around.

The dect did not break any laws since they were allowed legally into the home. A private dect is not under the same rules of evidence police are for having to have a warrant. Even if the dect broke the law by looking into closed draws, the evidence is not tainted because it was not done by the government. Your rights under search and seizure are protections from the government and more esp for criminal trials.

A lot, and I mean a lot of evidence not allowed in criminal trials can be used in civil trials.

So the real estate agent most likely never knew it happened, and the detective will most likely say that the draws were open and they took photos of things in plain sight.

You can lie and trick to get into places, as long as you get in legally, not break in.

kanicky73 · Feb 1, 2007, 11:24 AM

But when you say that you can lie and trick to get into places, how can that be "legal". I would think that there are in fact fine lines on what would be considered "deceitful".That kind of doesn't make any sense to say that OK I lied to get into your house and then took it upon myself to open your personal drawers to find whatever it is I am looking for. I do believe had anything been in "plain sight" as you called it, then maybe that is OK. But to actually have pictures of something in a drawer, implies that you had to open that drawer to see it. You would also have to make sure that the picture showed that you were in fact in that persons house, so you would have to make sure your pictures were taken with recognizable things in them. I understand too that if a law enforcement agent obtains evidence illegally such as unlawful entrance to a home or car or whatever, that evidence is not admissible because they obtained it illegally. Unfortunately there are laws that protect criminals. And law enforcement has to make sure that they do not violate someone's constitutional rights.

ScottGem · Feb 1, 2007, 11:30 AM

There is no law against lying or trickery. The only time its illegal to lie is when you give sworn testimony in a court of law.

My initial reaction was the same as Chuck's. The house is for sale which means anyone can gain access legally, by posing as a prospective buyer. So unless he can prove that the relator knew what the PI was doing, there is no case against them.

Frankly, I would not allow access to my home by strangers unless things were locked up that I didn't want them to have access to.

kanicky73 · Feb 2, 2007, 09:02 AM

Thanks for the info, I guess my friend is just out of luck and shouldn't have had those things around anyway! I tried warning him many times that he should just stop but he won't.

Fr_Chuck · Feb 2, 2007, 09:51 AM

I will give you some examples after I stopped being a police officer I thought it would be fun to work for a private dect ( watched way too much TV)

So I did all sort of odd and dirty jobs for them.

In serving papers for judgements or divorce, people would not just answer the phone, so we dressed like pizza delivery people, or some other company employee dressed in brown uniforms, no name on uniform so you had to 'think" of who we were.

But the most fun thing we dressed and pretended to be "bounty hunters" people esp those with some criminal history are scared of these people, so they KNEW they were not out on bond, and tha the bounty hunters were looking for the wrong person, if we were looking for JOE we would claim to be looking for SAM, so they would show us thier ID to prove they were not SAM, and we had them , served them and were gone.

But to get into thier houses there were an entire list of stories we used if we wanted to see inside the house for evidence with a hidden camera.
Getting to go in for an open house would have been so easy and not even a real "lie" ** the ladies could talk their way into houses a lot easier, from using the phone and then needing to use the bathroom.

It was just water we were spraying but what the heck.

kanicky73 · Feb 2, 2007, 09:55 AM

My next question then would be is there different laws that apply to that by state? I am quite sure that the way this PI entered the house may not have been illegal in some respect but I think the question lies on whether the evidence obtained in admissible and I think that may be where the laws by state fall into place. I think that using the realtor to gain access and then finding what your looking for would be probable cause to then ask for a search warrant. To actually take the pictures and get to use them in court was where I was hazy on.