mdt asked:
Hi, I am going through a research report for class. It’s a big project worth half my grade. We have to research a career and I chose homicide detective, one of the things I need to research is what does the average homicide detective go through every day. At first I figured I’d watch Law and Order, but I don’t it’s half accurate. So please help me. What does a homicide detective go through on a typical day at work?
Hi, I am going through a research report for class. It’s a big project worth half my grade. We have to research a career and I chose homicide detective, one of the things I need to research is what does the average homicide detective go through every day. At first I figured I’d watch Law and Order, but I don’t it’s half accurate. So please help me. What does a homicide detective go through on a typical day at work?
August 21st, 2011 at 9:07 am
Well, I could give you the patrol officers perspective on what a homicide detective does all day.
1. Arrives at office 5 minutes late
2. Spends first 30 minutes of day in the crapper
3. Has hour and half breakfast meeting with other detectives
4. 3 hours into day finally turns on computer at desk
5. Spends an hour sorting through junk emails and sending out chain letters to rest of department
6. 2 hour lunch break at the steak house
7. Takes a peek at his case file calls up a witness and arranges an interview
8. Spends rest of day “waiting” on witness to arrive
9. Complains about patrol officers not receiving proper statements from witness in first place
10. Puts in for overtime because witness shows up late justifies this by saying they just have to get this witnesses statement today!
Mr. Leslie I’m sorry you misread my post it was meant as a joke, I enjoy my job very much thank you and share a great relationship with our detective unit. Hence the title of a patrol officers perspective.
August 23rd, 2011 at 6:48 pm
dcpd is either a disgruntled patrol officer that didn’t make **** or it explains why DC has such a low solve rate.
It depends on what shift I was working, Usually 3rd watch (afternoons).
Depending on who was in court that day come in .5 hrs early to talk with other ***** that may have been working n any of my cases.
Review all new cases from my area in case I can add info or they may be related to mine or while I’m interviewing someone see if they know anything about any other current murder. It is amazing how much info a gang banger who won’t talk to you about his case will tell you about another case.
Check to see if anyone else has doing any work on any of my cases and review their work.
Report to the homicide sergeant to get and give any updates.
Start making calls trying to locate people i want to talk to, go out on the street trying to locate people I want to talk to.
Talk to any of the ME’s that worked on any of my cases and if I did not have time to attend the autopsy go and view the body myself.
Go over my partners cases the same way I went over mine.
Attend a round table with other 3rd watch ***** to talk about thier cases.
Catch up on reports (never done). Study case files/staements for tomorrows court.
Interview, interview, interview-go back to scenes and knock on another door once again.
This is assuming you don’t get a fresh one.
If you end up working it alone then you do all if your partner or anyone else is available they will come out to help, but near the end of my career with budget cuts that was rare.
You go to the scene or if the victim is still alive to the hospital (all to often I’ve been the last person to hold a victims hand and tell him that everything is OK). At the scene you direct the forensic folks, look around, do a plat, reconstruct the crime in your mind, canvass, canvass canvass. Handle continual phone calls from police brass /news affairs etc. explaining what is going on so they don’t look stupid to the press. Get back to the office to find the eye witness that a patrol officer dumped there with no info. try to find the patrol officer so you can peek at his report, find out that he lists 3 eye witnesses but did not bother to check their ID’s which you find are fake so you cannot find them (dicks get to complain to).Argue with the patrol sergeant who wants to reassign the patrol officer to directing traffic instead of finishing his report or talking to you. Argue with the patrol watch commander so he will authorize OT to the officer if needed.
Get a lead on the bad guy, try to get some back up and go arrest him.
Spend hours interviewing and then interrogating him while fending off family and friendly (to the bad guy) politicians and activists. Argue with the station watch commander that they need to process the bad guy carefully. After you get all your ducks in a row talk to the prosecutor and spend hours re doing all the interviews with the prosecutor so they are convinced there is a case.
and so on and so on.
You also get sent on errands by the brass and if anything else really big goes down they often take it away from other investigators and give it to you.
Working days you get stuck in court a lot so you do everything else in between.
Working midnights you do the same thing as afternoons but you have a bit more time to catch up on your typing.
Midnights is bad because people find bodies when they are going out in the AM to walk their dog or finally investigate that sound they heard at 11 pm. So an hour before you are to get off you get a fresh one and you get stuck with not sleeping often until your shift starts again.