Detective

Detective

A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes". Informally, and primarily in fiction, a detective is any licensed or unlicensed person who solves crimes, including historical crimes, or looks into records.

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Famous quotes containing the word detective:

    “Everybody thinks detectives do nothing but ask questions. But detectives have souls the same as anyone else.... You know, Mrs. Beragon, being a detective is like, well, like making an automobile. You just take all the pieces and put them together one by one. First thing you know you’ve got an automobile. Or a murderer.”
    —Ranald MacDougall (1915–1973)

    “I’ve always credited the private detective with a high degree of omniscience. Or is that only true in rental fiction?”
    —John Paxton (1911–1985)

    “The private detective of fiction is a fantastic creation who acts and speaks like a real man. He can be completely realistic in every sense but one, that one sense being that in life as we know it such a man would not be a private detective.”
    —Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)