Page 23 - NCISS Your Advocate December 2019

Important News for Members!

Passing of Jack Reed, NCISS Past President (1997-1998)
(contributed by John Lajoie, CLI – National Director, National Association of Legal Investigators)

Jack Reed, from Fullerton, CA. passed 09/04/2019. Jack started with repossession for collections, and in 1964 found
investigations. He went to work for a local PI doing collections, finding people, and serving process. Shortly thereafter,
he started his own agency - JHRI, Inc.

In 1971, while running his investigation agency and attending law school, he sustained a serious spinal injury that
required surgery. Something went terribly wrong and he was paralyzed from the neck down. Doctors and nurses told
him he’d never walk again. Reaffirming his lifelong philosophy “You can do almost anything if you want it badly
enough”, he first learned how to crawl, and then he struggled to walk. Finally, defying all medical probability, Jack
walked out of that hospital with a neck brace and 2 canes.

Jack joined CALI in 1971 and served on the Board in various positions for over 20 years; elected President in 1980-1981.
He served as either the Chair and/or member of the Legislative Committee, which is where he dedicated most of his
activities - fighting for the rights of investigators and security specialists.

With NCISS, Jack served on the Board for over 15 years, and was elected President in 1997-98. He, along with others
during his time of service, took the legislative battles to a National level. He dedicated much energy to fighting adverse
investigative and security related legislation and supporting those initiatives that would enhance our industry and make
it easier to do our jobs. While President of NCISS, Jack helped set up the framework for the State Associations to work
under the NCISS banner. In 1997, Jack helped organize the largest gathering of heads of private investigative
associations that had ever officially accumulated; 27 representatives from state, national, and international
organizations met in Phoenix AZ. There they discussed legislative issues and initiatives, and map out a future plan of
action to promote grass roots activism.

Jack testified on numerous occasions regarding privacy, access to public records, and adverse and favorable legislation
affecting our industry before the US Congress, Congressional sub committees, the Federal Trade Commission, the
California State Legislature, the State Judicial Council, and the Washington State Committee on Privacy. Jack was the
very first private investigator to be appointed and serve on the SEARCH Committee of Privacy and Criminal Justice
Information, a part of the US Attorney General’s office. His contributions and expertise in the areas of privacy, public
records, and legislation have caused politicians and privacy advocates to have a much higher opinion of private
investigators. Jack’s ability to work on our behalf behind the scenes were the successes we have enjoyed.

Jack’s contributions are many. But none have had more of an impact to investigators or have been as large as his
contribution to us all in the area of on-line, computer public record data and credit header information access. He
dreamed of something that we now take for granted on a daily basis. He dreamed of obtaining public records, putting
them into a database, and making these records available to investigators on-line. It took him four years, Jack formed a
company that would ultimately be named Information Resource Service Company, better known as IRSC. IRSC was the
very first business to sell information to investigators on-line! In 1982, Jack convinced the Federal Trade Commission to
give him permission to resell credit header information, IRSC was the very first to resell credit header Information to the
private investigator! In 1989, IRSC had access to more that 700 databases and was selling vital information, and in 1999
sold the company to Data Base Technologies (DBT).

In one article he wrote for NALI's The Legal Investigator:
“Privacy is your business, and if you don’t believe that, ignore it and see how quickly a new law will be written to restrict
your access to information”