Money's a magician. It disappears, shape shifts, and hides in plain sight. If you don't know what to look for, it may as well not exist at all. 

In this episode, Hal Humphreys talks asset searches with longtime colleague and friend Marcy Phelps, a professional researcher, licensed private investigator, and Certified Fraud Examiner. She's the author of Research on Main Street, owner of Marcy Phelps & Associates, and an instructor at PI Education. 

How do asset searches work? What laws govern what you can and can't do in researching assets?  How do you find hidden assets without getting into legal quicksand? Join Hal and Marcy as they dive into the what, why, and how of finding the money. 

See Marcy's new course on asset searches:

Check out Marcy's other fabulous courses at PI Ed:

Searching Online News for Due Diligence and Background Investigations
Research Secrets for Private Investigators
Searching Online Public Records Like a Pro
Mastering Online Public Records: Business Registrations
Mastering Online Public Records: Recorded Documents


🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

Jason Powell is a New York City firefighter and a debut author. His first novel, No Man’s Ghost, is an arson thriller about a firefighter’s first week on the job. It's a crime novel, and it’s kind of a mystery – a whydunit, let's say. In this episode, Jason explains why he wanted to bring to life the culture of an FDNY firehouse, how natural it felt for him to write the fire scenes, and why he decided to let the arsonist be one of his POV characters. And don't miss our lightning round, where we learn about Jason's favorite crime writers and novels.

Get No Man's Ghost anywhere you buy books. Even better, head to your favorite indie bookstore and ask for a copy there. Then keep an eye out for more of Jason's writing at authorjasonpowell.com.

🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

Your wallet goes missing. You cancel everything, but the alerts just keep coming: New bank accounts and credit cards in your name. Big charges. Damage to your credit score. It can take months or years to untangle all this. You may never get paid back in full. And nobody seems to be able to help you. Not the police. Not your bank. Not the government. 

Our guest, Carrie Kerskie, CAN help. She' a PI and identity theft expert who helps people recover from these crimes. And she’s made it her mission to help consumers protect themselves and to educate other investigators about how to work with victims of identity crimes. Kerskie is also an instructor with PI Education. In this episode, she talks about her upcoming ID theft investigations course — which covers how identity theft works, how these cases play out, and why fostering this expertise can be a game-changer — in your clients’ lives and in your own business.

🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

How does mortgage fraud even work? And how did these risky real estate schemes help fuel the 2008 mortgage meltdown?

Tune in to this special crossover episode of the Appraisal Buzzcast and Sound of Pursuit podcast to hear a gripping morality play about greed, speculation, the fraud triangle, and the dangerous allure of easy credit. Our guest is a Utah mom who lost herself in a tangled Ponzi-style real estate scheme involving hard money loans based on inflated appraisals. She ended up underwater, scrambling to keep up with ballooning debt, and under federal investigation as the 2008 mortgage crisis loomed.

Hear Portia share her raw, powerful story of committing fraud, going to prison, rebuilding her life, and educating others. Find out more at https://portialouder.com/

🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

Susan Waller Lehmann is a private investigator, a criminal defense and capital mitigation specialist, a journalist, and an award-winning author. She’s written for Pursuit Magazine, and she’s got a new book coming out soon. It’s a collection of stories about her casework in the Deep South, from process service and bitter divorce cases to capital murder cases. 

Southern Lies and Homicides is an honest peek behind the curtain at what a private investigator’s work is really like: often tedious, sometimes alarming, occasionally heartbreaking, and always, the most rewarding work there is. This collection is part memoir, part field guide. And it’s an essential read for anyone who’s considering this profession. In this episode, Hal and Susan talk about process service, defense cases, mitigation work, trash pulls, and much more.

Order Southern Lies and Homicides.

Read her recent essay in Pursuit, “The Persecution Rests.”

🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

Meet Rachele’ Davis: a longtime colleague and friend, occasional contributor to Pursuit Magazine, and now, the author of a course for PI Education. called "Finding Birth Parents for Adoptees, Donor-Conceived, and NPEs."

Rachele’ has a really interesting niche: She helps reunite birth families. Her clients are adoptees looking for biological parents or siblings, and sometimes, parents looking for the children they gave up for adoption. That process can be an emotional roller coaster for everybody involved. It requires diplomacy, ethics, and compassion to handle all that as an investigator.

In this episode, Rachele’ and one of her former clients talk about what it’s like to find out where you came from after wondering for your whole life, and what it’s like to escort a person through that process.

Get the course: Finding Birth Parents for Adoptees, Donor-Conceived, and NPEs


🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

"People don't understand what a bad day at the office means for people like us." That's a quote by Ben Lopez, a Chicago private investigator and the author of a moving personal essay in Pursuit about a case that came to a tragic conclusion — and the emotional toll it took on Ben.

Join host Hal Humphreys and Ben as they talk about Ben's essay, the cases that haunt all of us, and how we take care of ourselves in the face of trauma and tragedy.

Read Ben's story in PursuitMag.

And if you ever find yourself ruminating over a particularly troubling case, please talk to someone right away. You'll find Ben's number at the end of the article, and Hal shares his number at the end of the episode.

**CONTENT WARNING** - This episode includes a story about suicide.


🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

What IS due diligence, and what ISN'T it?

To answer this, Hal turns to our longtime colleague and friend Marcy Phelps, a professional researcher, licensed private investigator, and Certified Fraud Examiner. She's the author of Research on Main Street, owner of Marcy Phelps & Associates, and an instructor at PI Education. In the episode, Hal and Marcy talk about the why and how of due diligence investigations and give us a sneak peek at her brand-new due diligence course. Keep an eye out for that — it'll be approved soon!

While you wait, check out Marcy's other fabulous courses at PI Ed:
Research Secrets for Private Investigators
Searching Online Public Records Like a Pro
Mastering Online Public Records: Business Registrations
Mastering Online Public Records: Recorded Documents


🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

1986, Northern Ireland. A British spy is found dead by a desolate country lane — murdered by the IRA. Decades later, his killing set in motion the largest murder investigation ever in Britain and provoked painful national soul-searching about what spies should be allowed to to while serving their countries.

Join Hal and his guest, author and journalist Henry Hemming, to talk about Hemming's gripping new nonfiction spy thriller, FOUR SHOTS IN THE NIGHT: A True Story of Spies, Murder, and Justice in Northern Ireland. Find it anywhere you buy books.


🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!

Join host Hal Humphreys and his guest, Ramesh Nyberg, as they talk about Nyberg's  experiences in Florida law enforcement, including 22 years as a Miami homicide detective. In his new book, Badge Tie, and Gun: Life and Death Journeys of a Miami Detective, Nyberg shares what he's learned from nearly three decades on the force.
It's full of great stories for true crime fans—and investigative wisdom for gumshoes with and without a badge. Buy it here, and check out Nyberg's recent article in PursuitMag.

🔔 SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to watch these episodes:  /pieducation

✅ NEED INVESTIGATOR CE? We've got you covered: pieducation.com

🔥 STAY INFORMED with articles by and for investigators: pursuitmag.com


Pursuit Magazine and PI Education are part of StoryboardEMP, a media and education company in Nashville, TN. Pursuit, a free online magazine for private investigators, explores all things investigative, from gumshoe techniques and surveillance tech to industry news and crime in media. PI Education, its sister brand, provides high-quality online continuing education for licensed PIs. Pursuit and PIed are owned and edited by husband-wife team Hal Humphreys, a PI, and Kim Green, a writer and radio producer.

At this channel, you'll find an archive of briefings and webinars that dive deep into the work and the business of private investigations. Every month, we make more free stuff for you at this channel and PursuitMag, thanks to our generous expert-colleagues who contribute their expertise. And at PI Education, you can dive even deeper into the knowledge pool of this fascinating profession, with quality multimedia courses on dozens of topics. Subscribe to stay up to date!