Simon Fraser PI: a
hard-boiled interview
(Spoof news article)
This is the second of two spoof news articles inspired by the suspension of loudmouthed SFU Linguistics professor Hector Hammerly for allegedly threatening university administrators and purchasing an illegal stun gun. Controversy grew when it was revealed that the administration had hired a private investigator to monitor Hammerly’s off-campus activities. The first part of this story is Faculty and administration locked in deadly arms race, but they can be read in any order. Enjoy.
After a protracted legal battle and several petitions under the Freedom of Information Act, The Peak has finally forced the SFU Administration to release the name of the private investigator it hired to monitor the off-campus activities of Linguistics professor Hector Hammerly.
It was a hard job for a hard man, but The Peak finally located Mr. H. Bogie, sipping hard liquor in a dive at the hard end of Hastings Street. Before he passed out in a fit of existential angst, Mr. Bogie shared a few thoughts on the important ethical issues surrounding the hiring of private investigators to monitor faculty members, and the profound ramifications this practice has upon the constitutionally- protected rights to privacy and academic freedom.
Peak: Many people consider this business of the university monitoring its own faculty with private investigators to be very disturbing. Is this is common practice?
Bogie: The night was black, black as the bottom of a bottle of bourbon in the trunk of a black sedan on its way to the mud at the foot of the Fraser. It would be several hours yet before the razorblade sunrise would cut its way through the cracked glass of my office window and impale itself in my bloodshot eyes. But I didn’t care. It was curtains for Big Jake, and I was still breathing. It’s funny, how things sometimes turn out.
Peak: Ah. Have you personally been hired by the university before?
Bogie: I sat at my usual table and ordered a double scotch on the rocks. My cigarette winked at me like a devil from the mirror on the other side of the room. I knew who was on the other side of that mirror. Chester “Da Rock” Hawkings. That’s right, Louie’s boy. He’d be watching my every move, but I wasn’t goin’ to be puttin’ on a show for him tonight. The stakes were too high. I lit another cigarette. As the smoke curled towards the ceiling like a rattlesnake going in for the kill, I remembered what Freddy told me the night before he disappeared. And I realized that sometimes, murder can smell like a blood red rose. Real nice. Like perfume on a silk scarf. Real nice.
Peak: Really. To what degree do you think a university administration should be able to monitor its employees? Where would you, as a private investigator, draw the line between an employer’s self-protection and the individual’s right to privacy?
Bogie: I really don’t know what it was with me and double- crossin’ dames. Always a sucker for a nice pair of gams, I was. But this time I was in deep. Too deep. Blood on my hands and runnin’ on fumes, with the cops hot on my tail. I couldn’t take it any longer. I passed out, and when I awoke I found myself tied to a chair in Vinnie Garbanzo’s deep freeze. My head throbbed like a tenth-round knockout, and Little Vinnie was standing in front of me, polishin’ his jackknife in a way I didn’t like. He said I’d tell him where I’d stashed the loot, or he’d move me into an underground flat in Potter’s Field. I almost didn’t make it out if that one. But I did. And I never again drove over the Lion’s Gate Bridge.
* * *
So there you have it. Some day, we’ll get our answers about the SFU Administration’s use of private investigators to monitor faculty, staff, and even students for its own nefarious purposes. But for now... mum’s the word. •
Originally published in Peak spoof issue “The Clique”, May 5 1997. For more on this spoof story, see Faculty and administration locked in deadly arms race.
♦ ♦ ♦