Archive for the ‘California’ Category

Have you had the experience of searching an online court or Recorder index and getting a false negative? You know the name is there but it isn’t returned in your search results. Worse yet, you don’t know whether the record is there and assume it’s not because the site returned “no result.”

I was searching multiple names at the Alameda County Recorder Real Property index and found that results were returned only when the first name listed in a document was searched, but not the second name, even when that name was listed in the index. This only applies to shared last names, I believe.

I queried the name “Bennett, Lyle”, which returned a record in which that name was listed first. The index record for the document shows a second name, “Bennett, Doris.”

I searched the index for “Bennett, Doris” and received a “no record” message.

I’m sure the Recorder would like to hear from you about this glitch. I contacted the provider of the software and received an email directing me to resolve the problem with the Recorder.

What’s your experience searching online records?

• Screenshot History for websites

• SSDI Death Records

• California agencies issuing business permits and licenses

• Online Searchable Death Indexes, Records and Obituaries

• LegiScan | Keyword search legislation in 50 states

• Federal Motor Carrier Safety Licensing – Out of Service Carrier

• Federal Tax ID Number Search

• Dept. of Labor, Employee Benefits Security Administration, Abandoned Plan Search

• Disaster Affected Employer Search

• Global Terrorism Database

• Manhattan NYC 1940 Telephone Directory

• Historical Searchable Online City Directories

• The rest of my favorite links are here.

From BRB Publications newsletter:

Per PRRN Member Judith Smith, the Executive Director of the San Luis Obispo Superior Court – Ms. Susan Matherly – has simply had enough. Ms. Matherly has had it with all the public record search firms hired by employers to check criminal records of local residents that apply for jobs. On March 14th she announced at a local Bar Association luncheon that she was shutting down the public access terminal to background screening firms. And on Monday March 19th she did it. TheIT staff removed the public access computer and put it in a locked room to be accessible only by attorneys and their investigators.

To better understand Ms. Matherly’s logic, consider the following summarized statements she also made at the March 14th luncheon, as reported by Ms. Smith:

But wait, there’s more!

• ChangeDetection – Know when any web page changes

• InfoMinder – Web page tracker

• Commonwealth War Dead and Cemetery Database

• Charity and Non Profit Organizations Status Database

• Latest tweets and twitter trends | Chirpcity

• Find local blogs – Placeblogger

• State and Local Government Search Engine

• Google search bookmarklet for social search across the web

• Find neighbors on a street

• California Newspaper Catalog

• International Soundex Reunion Registry

• Lawyer profiles and assessments – Avvo.com

• Greg Notess: Speaker and Presenter on Web Searching for Researchers

• California Genealogical Society and Library Catalog

• California Libraries Catalog – find materials and libraries

• The Nonverbal Dictionary of Gestures, Signs & Body Language Cues

• NamUs – National Missing and Unidentified Persons System

• Missing Persons Database – California Dept. of Justice

• Google Plus Search, Google Plus Directory | Find People on Plus

• Access to Adoption Records – Summary of State Laws

• Information and Instructions to Verify Social Security Numbers Online

• UK Company Information

• Interstate Compact Offender Tracking System

• United States Online Historical City Directories

• Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database of slaving voyages

The rest of my favorite links are here.

The Sacramento County, California Sheriff has developed its own inmate release notification – Sheriff’s Inmate Release Elective Notification System (SIRENS) – that replaces the multi-agency VINELink (Victim Information and Notification) Everyday) program. The SIRENS service, like VINELink, will alert registered users by phone, text or email after a specified inmate is released. (See the SIRENS brochure for instructions.) Start by looking up the full name in the inmate search database.

Hopefully, VINELink won’t drop their Sacramento County incarcerated offender name search because it’s more flexible than the one at the Sheriff’s website. Both were functional today. The Sheriff’s site requires a full first name and full last name to find an inmate. That’s not helpful if you want to see everyone with the same last name — which you’ll want to do if you only have a nickname. Or maybe you want to see all of the possible relatives simultaneously incarcerated, right? The VINELink database can be searched with a partial first name AND a partial last name.

But these databases are better in tandem because the inmate information shown by the Sacramento Sheriff is more detailed. Alias’ and DOB’s are shown for those in custody and for released inmates, along with their release date. Because the date of birth is excised for out-of-custody inmates on VINELink you don’t know whether the “James Johnson’s” listed are the same person, or whether they are a match with those at the Sheriff’s site.

But neither site had private investigators in mind when they developed these tools.

• The British Newspaper Archive

• Obtaining EDs and streets for the 1910-1940 Census in One Step

• California Death Index 1940-1997

• California Birth Index – Free

• SimilarPages.com – Find similar websites

• SimilarSiteSearch.com – Find Similar Websites

• Company Director Check – free UK company director search

• Craigslist Alerts at List-Alert.com

• Open Status Search – Search Facebook without logging in

• Kurrently – A real-time search engine for Facebook and Twitter.

• Wolfram|Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine

• DuckDuckGo Search Engine

• Users Guide and Form Letter for The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)

The rest of my favorite links are here.