Investigative Techniques and Evidence Handling
Lawful planning
Good investigative technique begins with scope and authority. Identify the client, the lawful purpose, the facts sought, and the limits. Civil and criminal matters carry different rules. Do not trespass, impersonate police, hack accounts, or use illegal wiretaps. Nebraska generally allows recording a conversation with the consent of one party, but that does not authorize recording in a private place where a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy, and other laws may restrict the method.
Surveillance and interviews
Surveillance should be conducted from public vantage points or with consent. Record dates, times, locations, weather, distances, and the identity of the observer. Avoid chasing, blocking, or confronting subjects. In interviews, identify your role truthfully when required, avoid coercion, and do not claim government authority. Separate what the witness said from what you concluded.
Evidence integrity
Preserve originals. Label physical items with date, time, place, collector, and case number. Maintain a chain-of-custody log showing every transfer. For digital evidence, work from a forensic image, record hash values, preserve metadata, and store copies in a secure location. Notes should be contemporaneous and retained; reports should be factual, chronological, and explicit about gaps.
Worked example
An investigator receives a USB drive from a client's employee. She plugs it into her laptop, opens the files, and later copies selected documents into her report. At trial, the opponent challenges authenticity. The better practice is to document receipt, image the drive without altering it, hash the image, log custody, and describe the extraction method. Opening files on the original changes access times and undermines reliability.
Traps
Editing originals; summarizing without raw notes; failing to log custody; assuming one-party consent validates every recording; and writing conclusions as if they were observations.