ARE you, one person with a laptop, more likely to solve a crime than hundreds of experienced police officers? Obviously ‘yes’. Here’s how to go about it.
Watch too many true crime documentaries
The best armchair detective gorges themselves on a diet of real-life true crime stories. They reckon an obsession with perplexing Netflix documentaries and grisly podcasts is basically the same as extensive police training, if not better, because you aren’t fettered by annoying things like procedure, protocols or reality.
Spend too much time on social media
Once they’ve mainlined enough sensationalist murder shows, the armchair detective needs someone to discuss their incredibly clever theories with. Luckily social media is awash with similar twats only too keen to join in. If only the police stopped wasting their time with things like forensic analysis and went on Twitter. The crime rate would plummet.
Enjoy analysing weird details that mean nothing
Armchair detectives are experts in a variety of specialisms, such as body language and psychology. Their intensive training consists of watching hours of rolling news coverage. ‘The jogger who found the body blinked far too much when making that statement,’ they’ll declare, as if they’re watching Columbo, not a real person who has experienced a traumatic event and could react in any number of ways.
Be stupidly confident in your opinions
Being sure someone is guilty beyond reasonable doubt is a vital pillar of the British justice system, but one that doesn’t matter to the armchair detective. They will decide who did it then turn up at the crime scene and livestream themselves ‘revealing’ the perpetrator. When they’re arrested for wasting police time, it’s obviously a cover-up that goes ‘right to the top’.
Never apologise when you are inevitably wrong
Even though the armchair detective is convinced they’ve solved a crime because they’ve watched Making A Murderer three times, they will inevitably always be wrong. But that won’t lead them to consider whether they should get a new hobby. They’ll ignore their failures and move on to the next crime. This is all they have in common with the real police.
