Exonerations, Getting SWAT to a Victim, and Legalities of Eavesdropping

 This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau exonerations, getting to a victim on a SWAT call and the legalities of eavesdropping. I'm Adam Richardson, and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau. Welcome to episode number 125 of the Writer's Detective Bureau. And it is also the four year anniversary. Back in 2018 was when we started this podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime related fiction.

And I cannot believe it's been that long. So this week I am talking about exonerations after perjury, getting to a downed victim during a SWAT call and the legalities of eavesdropping.

Our first question this week is from Kathy Bennett, who is a retired LAPD officer, a crime fiction author, and my friend in real life. I actually met Kathy at the 20 books Vegas conference while we were on the police procedurals panel together. Speaking of which, Twenty Books Vegas will be held between November 14th through the 18th, 2022 at Bally's Casino in Las Vegas.

Bally's is actually being renamed Horseshoe, and in my humble opinion, Twenty Books Vegas is hands down the biggest and best author conference out there, and the only one I know of specifically for self published authors. Which seems to be key because the authors you meet at 20 Books Vegas will treat you like an equal, not a competitor.

Even if you come alone, like me, and are an introvert, like me, I promise you will have a blast. We take over the place, there's 2, 500 of us, hopefully. Uh, all friendly and supportive, and there's even a quiet room for us introverts when we get a little overwhelmed. More importantly, there are nearly 200 different sessions covering pretty much every genre and writing topic, uh, even if it's business, um, but writing related topic that you can think of.

Plus, you'll get the chance to talk to reps from Amazon, Google, Podium, Kindlepreneur, Book Funnel, Readzee, Draft2Digital, Sell More Books, and the list goes on. And it's. Awesome. I love this conference. Normally when I come back and I do a podcast after the conference, I'm still like on an adrenaline high because it's so much fun and I get to meet so many of you.

Um, it is literally a party. So if you'd like to finally get out of the house and be with your tribe, come join us in November in Vegas. There are still plenty of tickets available. Just go to 20 books, vegas. com and that's the number two and zero books, vegas. com. So come find me. I might even buy you a beverage.

And I will definitely be there for the police procedurals panel again, uh, with my buddy Patrick O'Donnell and hopefully with Kathy Bennett, who's Question I am taking my sweet time getting to. So Kathy worked for LAPD and although she did some alone time to detectives, she never became one because she loved working the streets so much.

And by the way, you can find her books by going to Kathy Bennett dot com and that's Bennett with a double N and a double T. So, here's her question regarding her current work in progress. Kathy writes, Here's the scenario. My two detectives arrested a female deputy chief for 187 of a private investigator and she goes to prison.

In case you aren't a cop in California or listen to gangster rap, 187 is the California Penal Code section for first degree murder. Okay. Now, several years later, a guy arrested for selling dope says that the deputy chief didn't kill the PI, but knows who did. The dope slinger wants a deal. He'll ID the real murderer if he can skate on the dope charge.

I'm going to work it so that both my detectives are working this new investigation, but what would they do first? The dope suspect hasn't been mirandized, and he hasn't asked for an attorney. This is his first arrest. The true murderer of the PI Is the Deputy Chief's husband. Back during the original murder investigation of the pi, the detectives knew that the husband had hired the PI to follow his wife.

The guy selling drugs who knew the husband, but no one knows they're connected, lied during the investigation of the murder of the PI saying he saw deputy chief leaning into the PI's vehicle at the time of the murder. He also said that he saw the deputy chief's car at the scene of the murder. So, how would my detectives try to verify any of this is true?

Oh, and when my detectives go to question the deputy chief's husband, the true killer of the PI, they find him dead, so he's no help. Thank you. This is a juicy one. The husband being dead certainly puts a major wrench in things. To start with, the detectives would likely get the DA involved. Not even likely, absolutely get the DA involved when it comes to the terms of an informant contract.

The contract would basically say the dope slinger needs to do X, Y, and Z to avoid being charged with the drug dealing charges. That X, Y, and Z would be for him to voluntarily go on the record, post Miranda admonishment, and talk about what actually happened and to agree to a polygraph examination. At this point, the case is really more about exonerating an innocent woman rather than proving the husband's guilt, since he's dead.

The detectives would get the guy's statement and do everything they could to corroborate what he says is the truth. But the polygraph would be the real key here. Now, polygraph results are very rarely used in court because the science behind them is not accurate enough for the courts to steadfastly rely upon them.

For the poly results to be admitted as evidence, we'd have to have both The prosecution and the defense stipulate to their admittance as evidence, but we aren't going to court in this case. What we were trying to do is find evidence that the deputy chief has been wrongly convicted. Assuming the drug dealer goes through the polygraph and the results show no signs of deception when he admits to lying during the initial investigation about the P.

I. talking to the deputy chief of the car, then that would likely be sufficient to get the D. A. to seek the release of the deputy chief from custody. Once this occurs, the D. A. would agree that the informant met his terms on the informant agreement, and the dope arrest would vanish. Now, Kathy knows this next part, but for the benefit of all the other listeners here in California, we also have Penal Code Section 849B.

That's lowercase b, not that you need to remember that, there will not be a quiz later. Uh, but with 849B of the Penal Code, um, we essentially allow the police to release the person without charges after a detention. So the dope dealer would get an official 849b form that says this was only a detention and not an arrest.

It's basically our way of un arresting somebody. Now the final twist would be as a detective on the case, I would then seek formal charges against the dope dealer once our deputy chief is released from prison for perjury. Assuming that he testified in the deputy chief's murder trial about seeing her talking to the PI at the car

Before we get to our next question. I just need to quickly thank my patreon patrons for supporting this show Especially my gold shield patrons at Deborah Dunbar from Deborah Dunbar comm CC Jamison from CC Jamison comm Larry Keaton Vicki tharp@vickitharp.com. Larry Darter, Natalie Borelli Craig Kingsman of Craig kingsman.com.

Marco o Carroll Carri of Marco carroll carri.com. Rob Kerns of Knights fall press.com. Mariah Stone of mariah stone.com Aurora Jacobson. Kaylee and Robert Mendenhall of RobertJMendenhall. com for their support, along with my Silver Cufflink and Coffee Club patrons. You can find links to all of the patrons supporting this episode in the show notes at writersdetective.

com forward slash one two five. And to learn more about using Patreon to grow your author business or to support the show, check out writersdetective. com forward slash Patreon. P A T R E O N

Annette Dashavi of Annette Dashavi dot com writes, Hi Adam, I'm writing about a SWAT situation. The bad guy has killed someone and taken a family hostage. He fires on the first police units that arrive before retreating into a house with his hostages. Once SWAT has arrived, how would they handle the dead body lying between them and the house?

They're in clear view of the house and the shooter. If I'm thinking correctly, they would send a team with ballistic shields out to check on the victim's status since they don't know yet if he's dead or just badly injured. What then? If they determine he's deceased, would they back off and leave the body there for the coroner or medical examiner, or would they carry him out of the line of fire?

Or am I completely wrong? In which case, please help me with the correct procedure. Thanks once again for all you do to help us get it right. Thanks for the question, Annette. Not only is Annette a great crime fiction writer, she's also a graduate of the very first Writer's Detective School cohort, which by the way, cohort 22 3 will begin on August 1st, 2022.

So if you're listening before, August 1st, 2022. Go to writersdetectiveschool. com to learn more about this cohort. If it's after August 1st, 2022, and you'd like to get more info on the next cohort, go to writersdetective. com forward slash waitlist, and you'll be the first to know when the next cohort opens for enrollment.

Now, back to Annette's question, most modern SWAT teams have armored vehicles, the most popular of which are called Bearcats, made by a company called Lenco, L E N C O. You can see what these look like by going to writersdetective. com forward slash Bearcat, B E A R C A T, which will take you to the Lenco website.

So, SWAT teams use these armored vehicles as giant mobile ballistic. backstops. So an element of the team would drive the bearcat right up on the lawn of the house between the victim and the front door, and the members of the team would check on the life status of the victim under the cover of that bearcat.

If the victim is still alive, they'd pack them up in the back of the bearcat and get them to wherever paramedics are staged at the outer perimeter of the scene. Um, and if the victim has succumbed to their wounds, they would leave them in place until the scene was secure and turned over to detectives.

Now, if this was the case, the bearcat would simply stay in place, as it would prevent any errant rounds fired by the suspect inside the house from hitting anyone across the street or in a neighboring house.

Hi Adam, my name is Pat. Really appreciate your show, uh, thank you, and uh, look forward to introducing myself and buying you a drink at the next... Uh, 20 Books Vegas. Here's my question. Um, It's a task force composed, uh, in San Diego, California, composed of several different law enforcement personnel. Um, they can't get a warrant, and what they want to do is they want to, uh, monitor a conversation on the top floor of a hotel room, you know, the bad guys.

And for whatever reason, they can't get a warrant. Um, so they decide to send in a civilian wearing smart glasses. Uh, now this civilian is involved in the case. You know, it's his sister who got kidnapped and he's Mexican. So since it's a two party consent state, uh, they can't legally record, but the plan is to send them in and if an emergency situation occurs.

Then they can, they're waiting in a nearby spot and they can come in and storm the building. Um, the civilian wouldn't care that might, the way I figured it out was that the civilian doesn't care if he gets, you know, does something illegal, really. He just wants to save his sister because by the time anybody would charge him with anything or, you know, he just goes back to Mexico where he lives.

And he's a poor guy, you know, doesn't have anything to lose really. So is that legal? Is that what, uh, you would do or what advice do you have about this situation? Maybe I should just have them get a warrant. Thank you. This is awesome. Uh, we have a few different things going on with this scenario, pat. The first is that our civilian, the victim's brother, is acting as an agent of the police.

So him not caring about the ramifications doesn't really help the case. Any recording he makes would likely not get admitted as evidence, nor can we, we, being the police and our agent, the brother, uh, nor can we manufacture the emergency. At least that's how the courts would see things. But hey, if it were my sister, I wouldn't care about that either.

I just want to know where she is. The next question is, why does this guy, the brother, think the bad guys will reveal that at this meeting? Is the brother planning to do something to prompt that conversation, or just eavesdrop? More importantly, Would they recognize him as her brother? These are rhetorical questions at this point, of course.

Um, the legal and proper way of going about this does involve getting a court order, specifically an order allowing for a wiretap. But since your story is set in San Diego, California, we have some pretty specific limitations. If you've listened to the podcast for any length of time, you've likely heard me talk about the difference between state and federal laws, state and federal crimes and state and federal courts.

And of course, county jails, state prisons and federal penitentiaries and federal correctional institutions. Anyway, the idea being that the systems are entirely separate. This is especially true for wiretap law. California law only allows for wiretaps to be used to intercept electronic communications. So if a serious state crime like California Penal Code Section 207, the state crime of kidnapping, has been committed, then I could go through all the hoops to get a wiretap order to listen to our suspects phones in real time and see their text messages in real time.

Um, and that's me being a Peace officer, uh, sworn to uphold California law. What I cannot do under California law is bug a room. I cannot put a mic in the salt shaker on their table. Only federal law allows for room bugs, which is essentially what your protagonists are trying to do. A federal law enforcement agent like an FBI special agent or a DEA special agent involved in this case.

could go after a Title III court order to allow for this, but again, it will be a lot of time consuming work and not something they could accomplish in an hour or two. If they do go that far as to get a federal wiretap order, they'd likely include the phones in that order as well. The next stage would then be figuring out how to plant the listening device, whether that's a mic in the flowerpot or a parabolic mic from a distance is totally up to you.

Realistically, listening to a bunch of phones, pinging the locations of their phones, and putting trackers on their cars would probably yield more useful results. Now that's not to say you can't send your protagonist into surreptitiously video record or take photos of the suspects and use that to initiate a surveillance where the goal is to ID their vehicles and who they are.

If that's all that's known, uh, is that a meeting is taking place and your initial goal is to find out who's who in the zoo. Um, the good news is that San Diego really does have some fascinating federal task forces that deal with border related crimes. My very first day. As a detective in 1999 was running an op with one of these San Diego based task forces.

Ironically, that was made up of DEA, U. S. Customs. Um, I'm showing my age with that since they're now HSI, Homeland Security Investigations, um, Border Patrol, as I recall, which again is now named Customs and Border Patrol, CBP. Um, Add in an FBI special agent for the kidnapping aspect and you're good to go on a realistic task force.

Uh, you might even throw in, uh, some local cops from San Diego police or San Diego Sheriff's department. Now I'm not at liberty to disclose the actual name for this task force, but you can just come up with a generic name like task force. with a number behind it, like task force 17 or something, and you'd be surprised how realistic that might be.

It's worth noting that the task force would have existed before this case, and it would continue to exist after this case, and it would not be just an ad hoc working group created just for this investigation, which is great news. If you want to turn this into a series and stick with the same task force in the same region.

Lastly, Remember that your task force folks cannot cross over into Mexico with guns, otherwise they'll very likely get arrested in Mexico. They will have to coordinate with Mexico's authorities for any kind of official action, but they'd likely have dedicated liaisons in Mexico already established, given the nature of their work.

So, I hope this helps, and thanks for sending in your question via audio, and I look forward to meeting you in Vegas, too. Thanks, Pat. Thank you so much for listening this week. Do you have a question for me? You can send it to me by going to writersdetective. com forward slash podcast. You can even send it via audio just like Pat did by clicking on the little microphone on that page.

Thanks again for listening. Have a great week and write well.