For my story, I have been having trouble coming up with evidence that would be admissible in court. Basically the MC is on the trail of a gang of crooks who have victimized him as well as several other people. So the case becomes personal for him and he takes matters into his own hands, since the villain keeps getting away with it. But even though the MC has taken matters into his own hands I cannot find a way for him to beat the system, when it comes to making evidence admissible. It seems that the law is well covered in this, and it's always fruit of the poisonous tree, if a cop decides to go off the reservation, so to speak. However, I was wondering if the latest scenario I came up with would work. What if that cop faked his own death and made it appear that the villains are the most likely suspects... The cop gives the police force, enough bread crumbs that leads to the suspects property and associates, and the police can get warrants to search, do wire taps, etc. The police then find evidence, not on the cop's faked death, but on evidence of the gang's past crimes... The only thing is, if a cop fakes his death and the police investigate it, but then find out it was a faked ruse on his part likely, but however, turned up evidence of other crimes 'accidentally', in the process, can they use that evidence cause it was turned up by accident? For example, there seems to be a fine legal line in the difference between fruit of the poisonous tree evidence, compared to evidence, that was found accidentally, while investigating another matter. If the matter that is being investigated was a ruse, could the evidence of other past crimes, discovered by accident still be used, in relation to those past crimes, as long as the evidence proves to be authentic? And even though the fake death was a ruse, what if the investigation of the fake death, was all done by the book? Can the accidental evidence still be admitted then, compared to not doing things by the book, resulting in evidence being tainted? Or maybe it would be better for the crooked cop, to fake his own kidnapping instead, and have the police investigate him being kidnapped instead, cause he could then have a better reason for being alive, and say he escaped the kidnapping.
Whether or not the evidence would be admissible here, I think it's somewhat unlikely that the dots would be connected from one crime to the next, no matter the intricacy of the bread crumbs. One of the reasons that it's often difficult to track down serial killers is that unless there are obvious DNA matchups (which aren't as precise as you may have been led to believe) with what's on file, individual crimes are unlikely to be linked together.
Okay thanks. However, the faked death does not have to be related. It just has to lead to the evidence for the killer's past crimes. So as long as it takes the police to the destination of where the evidence is kept, it does not have to actually be related to the faked death, other than the destination, if that makes sense.
