By the time you read this the Holidays will be over and everyone will be looking forward to the Super Bowl and that first credit card statement of the New Year. Not all of us non-retailers spent the holidays shopping, celebrating and home with the family. Christmas seems to be a popular day to work in the investigative business. Two years ago, I recall driving around Christmas Morning with a distraught Mother looking for her children. Children who were with her estranged husband, they were being shuttled back and fourth between his relatives in a kind of sick controlling shell game. The Christmas season will tend to bring out the worst and the best of us, at different doses. You would think that when one is having a domestic dispute that you could at least call a truce for the Holidays. Even a World War actually stopped for a Christmas Truce.

Ms. Kitty and Marshal Dillon

There is never a dull moment when you’re dealing with sex, love and forbidden fruit. There was this particular female and for the sake of this article we will call her Miss Kitty who was tangled up in a love affair with a bad boy dangerous outdoor mountain man type we will hereafter refer to as Dillon (short for Marshall Dillon). It seems that Dillon was an a pretty good guy, he worked hard long hours, lived with his parents taking care of them and generally got along well with everyone. I guess you can say that was accurate to a point, you see Dillon was totally different when he got a whiff of Meth, a shot of booze a pill or two, or if you just plain made him angry. It seemed that his mood would change at the drop of a hat. Lord forbid if you came under Dillon’s wrath when he was loaded. One such victim had a .45 pistol dry fired in her mouth. Another victim was beaten to a pulp numerous times in the family home. Dillon was pretty determined to do what Dillon wanted to do. Restraining orders did nothing to stop his activities they just enhanced his creativity and fortified his anger.

Kitty Looses Marshal Dillon

Now we have a situation where Ms. Kitty is all up into Dillon and Dillon just loves to flop at Kitty’s place for the night. The only problem is that Kitty has kids and the children’s father does not appreciate Dillon nor his violent temper around the children. A local Magistrate sees this matter in court and rather than taking Ms. Kitty’s children from her, issues orders forbidding Dillon any contact with Kitty, regardless of the children’s presence. The consequences of not following this order would mean forfeiture of Kitty’s substantial parenting time.

It seems there a dilemma here. Kitty had just won majority custody of her children. She now must choose between Dillon and her own flesh and blood. It seems that the temptation of that forbidden fruit got the best of her. Dillon was too irresistible for her. No, she didn’t have to choose between both. She just won’t get caught. What takes place over the next several months is an elaborate covert operation in which Dillon would nightly sneak into Kitty’s house, spend the night in her bed and exit long before her children would get up. The children’s father knew what was going on; he just couldn’t prove it that’s when we were called into the case by the father’s diligent attorney.

Kitty gets caught

Our job was basically to get the goods on Kitty and Dillon; it was a relatively easy operation because they could not be together period. We just had to find out how they were operating and then be there to capture the show on tape. Finding out how they operated was not as easy as it might seem. Congested roads combined with icy conditions made tailing extremely difficult. We were out on Kitty three or four times before we tracked her down enough to gather what was going on. Kitty and Dillon would meet each other away from her home and then go to her home together in Kitty’s vehicle. When the children were present, Dillon would park away from Kitty’s house and do the creepy crawl back to Kitty’s home, slip in a window or an open door and they were in for the night.

We wrapped things up on Christmas day with these two. The climax of it all was getting footage of Dillon boldly driving into Kitty’s drive way, Kitty running out to greet him with hugs and kisses, then both relieving his SUV of several loads of presents. Dillon then speeds a few blocks away to park and walks back to Kitty’s home there to stay for a couple of days.

Marshal Dillon goes to Jail

A month later in court Kitty and Dillon both denied they had seen each other at all over the past few months. Kitty even went so far as to accuse Dillon of stalking her. That was in response to her children overhearing our clients conversations with us and reporting back to her. She took action, but it was too late and fraudulent. We had our goods. We played our tape and testified in court. It was all over, our client protected his children. Kitty and Dillon were exposed for what they were. We all know that Ms. Kitty never got her man, and in this sad case she lost her kids too. Dillon is currently on his way to the Idaho State Pen on unrelated charges.

Phillip Thompson is a Vice President and Sr. Investigator for Confidential Investigations. Mr. Thompson has a business degree from Central Washington University and has been involved in investigative work and fraud detection for 8 years. He joined Confidential Investigations in 2002. He can be contacted at 208-762-5767 or email phil@idahoprivateeye.com.