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Notes -
And The Band Played On is probably the most famous mainstream account of the early HIV/AIDS crisis and was written by a San Francisco Chronicle reporter who later died of AIDS himself. Interestingly he does lay some of the blame at the feet of promiscuity in the gay subculture of the time, which actually drew increasing criticism through the ‘90s, much of it posthumous as he died in 1994. Iirc the Salo account uses it as a source, though I don’t remember and it’s been years since I read either of them.
I think in real life private detectives are more specialized than in the movies and almost never investigate homicides - certainly not during the initial police investigation - which seems to be the big difference. As I understand there tend to be a few types: the private eye firms who do divorces, infidelity, background checks on daughters-in-law commissioned by overbearing mothers, attorneys during an active case against their client, that kind of thing. Then there are big corporate investigations firms like Kroll and others who do more complete private investigation, find witnesses, work internationally to track laundered money, do government work, that kind of thing. Then lastly there are a bunch of retired detectives for hire who attorneys, families and individuals hire when they’re unsatisfied with a police investigation / cold case stuff, where the aim is to find new evidence to reopen an investigation, bring an appeal etc.
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