This article appeared in the The Legal Investigator in the summer 2006 edition, and highlights John Lajoie’s creative writing skills as he tackles a subject near and dear to the hearts and minds of all professional PI’s. Who should the public hire? Of course, Lajoie!  Seriously, who should you hire when searching for a local or state PI? When should a PI travel? And what are the rules of the [...]

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A sensitive missing person investigation case came into my office from an out of state client in 2002.  A man was searching for his brother whom he had not seen since 1969.  The brother, who I will call Mr. Smith, went missing from the US Military in Okinawa in the early 1970’s while a low ranking enlisted soldier. He was eventually determined to have deserted from service by military [...]

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All good investigators should be able to conduct solid, thorough interviews and take written and recorded statements when proper and necessary. But what the heart and soul of criminal defense investigation calls for is an esoteric endeavor to many investigators who get scared just thinking about a recorded statement. John Lajoie is famous for his interviewing and statement taking skills. In this [...]

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What a morbid subject! But someone has to read them. John Lajoie is a pro at reading, interpreting, and extracting information from death certificates and autopsy reports for investigation purposes. Whether involved in a criminal or civil death investigation, the death certificate and/or autopsy report can make or break the case. In this article which was published in the 2004 fall/winter issue of[...]

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In this award winning article that was first published in The Legal Investigator in 1997, John M. Lajoie, CLI, intricately details the many investigative techniques and steps required to conduct a successful criminal defense “self-defense” investigation. Defense theories, legal elements, conditions and stages are discussed; indexing and file management is explained; preliminary investigation, [...]

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