Small town investigator

It might seem like Don Johnson has a tough job as chief investigator and owner of Trace Investigations in Bloomington.\nRunning a private investigator firm in a small town appears to present disadvantages for a practice many people associate with shadowy figures lurking in the dark.\nThat's not the case, Johnson said, as he discounts the common misconceptions the public has about private investigators. \nOn the contrary, most of Johnson's work is "pretty up front," he said. Despite being known around town, working in a small market actually provides Johnson with a competitive advantage as the only certified legal investigator in the area, he said.\nJohnson, who started Trace in 1990, never expected to rely on the Bloomington market for all of its business, but the years proved him wrong, and Trace has profited. \n"I thought I would have to expand beyond Bloomington and (the) Monroe County general area and cover all of Indiana," Johnson said. \nAccording to Hoover's Inc. business database, Trace's annual sales are $110,000 -- which is within the range of $150,000 that most small investigative firms gross within a small market, Johnson said.\nTrace has stayed in Bloomington because of its main customer base of local personal injury and insurance defense attorneys. These cases are the norm for firms like Trace that specialize in investigations involving litigation.\nHowever, shades of the public's common conception of P.I.'s do surface. One of the most intriguing cases Trace has investigated occurred when the adult children of an elderly woman became suspicious of their mother's caretaker. The caretaker seemed too wealthy and too trusting. Her out-of-town boyfriend suddenly arrived as well.\nThe children contacted Trace to investigate. The company discovered the caretaker had lived in several states for the past 20 years and had been sued many times. The boyfriend also had a criminal record for assaulting an elderly person. \nWith this information the children took custody of the mother, and the caretaker was fired while the boyfriend escaped.\nThe investigation discovered that the caretaker and boyfriend planned to take the mother on a road trip to Canada. When "unprescribed medicines" within the mother's home and an unsigned will were discovered, Johnson believed the mother never would have returned from the trip to Canada. But there wasn't enough evidence to convict the caretaker, and she moved out of state.\nThe company also investigates family law cases. It's those assignments where being a P.I. in a small market can involve competition for Trace's services from both sides.\nJohnson said sometimes a client will hire him in a family law case. Then the opposing side will call and try to employ him.\n"You simply say, 'I have a conflict of interest,'" Johnson said. "And they don't ask you anymore."\nThis is part of the life of a P.I. in a small town, but cases like these aren't the norm, as Trace's projects usually cover legal issues. When Johnson investigates a personal injury case, the work usually involves tracking down witnesses and taking statements. When he's involved in insurance defense, he's doing surveillance and investigating workers' compensation claims.\nIn a small town like Bloomington, Johnson doesn't worry about concealing his identity. He's actually more concerned with making sure he obeys the law and his ethics.\n"If you conceal your identity in some instances and deceive a person to get information," Johnson said, "then that information may not be valuable to that attorney because you've deceived that person into revealing things to you."\nAlthough Johnson wouldn't say which attorneys are his clients, he stays busy serving about 12 lawyers in the area from various law firms. \nHelping Trace maintain its client base is Johnson's certified legal investigator distinction. Johnson said there are only about 125 CLI's in the United States. CLI's are members in the National Association of Legal Investigators, whose "primary focus (is) to conduct investigations related to litigation" according to the organization's Web site, www.nalionline.org.\nNALI's national director, Robert Townsend, praised Johnson for his ability to effectively run Trace in a small market with a limited number of attorneys. \n"In a small town you have to be more socially active where that business grows in order to make yourself visible enough to obtain enough business to make a livable income," Townsend said.\nIndividually, Johnson speculates that most P.I.'s in Indiana charge about $60 an hour. He said he charges more because he's a certified legal investigator. Including Trace, there are six CLI's firms in Indiana, with three located in Indianapolis. \nBeing certified, combined with his specialization of working with attorneys to help take cases to trial, has allowed Johnson and Trace to carve a niche in Bloomington for 15 years. \nTrace faces many of the same difficulties other small businesses encounter. The investigations are easy for Johnson, he said, but the hardest part is the noninvestigative work. From keeping payroll, paying taxes and time management, Trace faces the same difficulties as other small businesses, Johnson said.\n"How do you schedule yourself in a given week when the demands change every day?" Johnson asked.\nBut unlike many small businesses, Trace hasn't had to adjust to a bigger company coming into town. Trace has stayed consistent in serving the small market community of Bloomington.\nAnd its work hasn't included a shadowy P.I. in a trench coat.\n"The days of Rockford files and 007 are passed," Townsend said.\n-- Contact Staff Writer John Rodgers at jprodger@indiana.edu.