Cyber Law

If you have never been the victim of a cyber stalker you probably just assume that if a crazed cyber bully ever targets you all you need to do is make a simple police report and the crime will be investigated and prosecuted. Nothing could be further from the truth and no one knows this better than victims of cyber stalkers and the private investigators they hire to locate and identify the stalkers.

Unfortunately the victims of these kinds of crimes know all too well that after making a police report the sad fact is that nothing ever comes of it. The patrolman that show up to take the initial report do not see it as a serious threat. They will suggest the victim turn off their computer, ignore the stalking, delete the emails unread. These officers are accustomed to visiting homes on domestic violence calls and burglaries and they just don't understand the impact cyber stalking and bullying has on the victims.

It's a double edged sword. Large urban police departments will have computer crime units. They have trained personal, they have the software, the tools and the training. However they are overloaded with cases and can only expend time on serious threats and large money crimes. many times much of their efforts will be in support of murder investigation or large drug cases or organized crime prosecutions.

While small town police departs will not have the necessary training, software or equipment to do even the most basic of computer crime investigations. They routinely send out their computer crimes to out side venders and will not spend that kind of recourses on what they may consider an insignificant only harassment investigation..

This is why the majority of cyber stalking victims will retain the services of private investigators to do all initial leg work to locate and identify the stalker. Then reduce that investigation to a report that can be turned over to local law enforcement. In some cases the private investigator will be called to testify but many times the local police can duplicate the steps of the investigation and the PI will not be required in court.

The real solution to this problem would be to reclassify all computer crimes as Federal crimes, then all these investigations could be handled routinely in one central location. victims would not be subject to the whims or budget restrictions of local law enforcement agencies.

Copyright (c) 2011 Opperman Investigations Inc