Sydney Private Investigator takes on "Homeland"

Sydney private investigator Agency99 Investigations was recently asked to provide a short surveillance training course for some media types to assist with the promotion of the Emmy award winning US television show “Homeland”.

Agency99 Investigations, along with sister agencies Integral Investigations and Lipstick Investigations, and its training arm The Investigative Collective organised a crash-course being a private investigator in Sydney coinciding with the release of Homeland Season 2.

Part of the surveillance training course was held in a classroom and then after covering all of the basics the students set out into the beautiful city of Sydney for a field exercise. Of course we had to engineer the whole private investigation exercise due to the limited time so we had a couple of licensed private investigators briefed to be the ‘bad guys’ and there were two other investigators leading the students around explaining techniques and the best way to carry out an investigation of this nature. We had to engineer the exercise in such a way that it covered the common types of activities a target will do – static surveillance (watching a target form a fixed point), foot surveillance (Following on foot) and mobile surveillance (following in vehicles).

The class followed one target through the city streets on foot before she jumped on a bus, then a ferry, where she met with a second target and exchanged some ‘stolen documents’. They both then went and got on a train, before separating. The new target then hailed a cab where we had a pursuit vehicle waiting. The cab was followed to a drop-off point where the ‘stolen documents’ were delivered to the final destination.

The private investigators and the students all met up at the end for a debrief and a chat about the difficulties encountered – and the successes enjoyed. All participants agreed that being a private investigator in Sydney is not the easiest thing to accomplish!

There were a number of articles written by the students (journalists) including these light-hearted looks at being a Sydney private investigator. The first is an article written by Toby McCasker from the Fairfax publication “The Vine”. You can read the article by following this link 

And a second entertaining article was written by Cathy Morris and published in mX Magazine – of which over six hundred thousand copies are handed out to Sydney commuters.

Agency99 have offices in Sydney and the Gold Coast, and have trusted affiliates right around the country. Call us on 1300 547 784 or email your inquiry to enquiries@agency99.com.au