The original records contained phrases like does not appear to be a resident and unfamiliar individual near upscale property.
No specific criminal conduct was identified.
Yet the reports were sometimes submitted through the company's police liaison process as suspicious-person contacts.
The investigators examined how those reports were screened.
They found inconsistencies.
Some dispatchers requested clarifying information before creating calls for service.
Others accepted the private security summary and sent officers without establishing what conduct actually required a police response.
The problem wasn't that a private security company could contact police.
Anybody could report a legitimate concern.
The problem was treating unverified assumptions as though they were reliable evidence of wrongdoing.
And certain officers appeared especially willing to accept those assumptions.
Nathan Cole was one of them.
The department's records showed that he had responded to an unusually high number of CrestWatch-related calls over the previous year.
Some resulted from his assigned patrol area.
But other contacts appeared to involve requests that he or certain colleagues handle particular complaints.
Investigators wanted to know why.
Then they found an email exchange between Harlan's operations manager and a retired police supervisor who worked as a private consultant for CrestWatch.
The consultant's name was Frank Dorsey.
He was sixty-three, with a long history in law enforcement and extensive personal connections throughout the region.
Dorsey had retired from policing several years earlier.
He now advised private security companies on reporting procedures, training, and coordination with public agencies.
In principle, that work was legitimate.
A former police supervisor could help security personnel understand when to call emergency services and how to document observations accurately.
But Dorsey had developed a habit of treating his old professional relationships as though they were still a private chain of command.
He contacted current officers directly.
Invited them to company events.
Recommended them for lawful off-duty assignments.
And sometimes asked whether particular calls could receive extra attention.
Most of those interactions weren't necessarily improper.
But the line between ordinary professional contact and inappropriate influence could become thin when private clients began expecting special treatment.
Dorsey knew Nathan Cole.
He'd worked with him briefly when Cole first joined the department.