Financial Investigator Philip Segal: “5 Things You Need to Know to Survive and Thrive During and After a Divorce”

If someone isn’t required to talk to you because you’re not the police and you haven’t subpoenaed them, it really helps to be able to chat with them in a nonthreatening way.

The truth hurts, especially when it involves learning your spouse lied to you, stashed cash away in places you never knew about and stole funds from you and your children for their own gain. Let’s be honest, these are conversations no one wants to have, face, or hear but there is too much is at stake not to. Look at this another way. How are you going to pay the mortgage, the electricity bill and put food on the table if you don’t investigate where the family assets are you are entitled to? Again, what feels like a punch in the stomach is temporary. You will get through this and with the right mind set you will come out swinging. But, as I say in almost every column, it all starts with hiring the right team. Philip Segal is the founder of Charles Griffin Intelligence a New York City investigative firm is widely known for handling complex international financial transactions and probes from suspecting clients. If you need a real sleuth to do a deep dive and trace your money, Segal is the guy who can uncover the facts.

Ilyssa Panitz: Why did you decide to combine your background as a journalist and a lawyer by investigating and digging into people’s financial backgrounds when they are going through a divorce?

Philip Segal: After 19-years as a journalist doing mostly finance, I went to law school but found that I was best suited to doing investigation — a mixture of law, business research and journalism. You have to understand the legal context of your clients and the legal cases you find during your research, but you also have to be able to play hunches, keep multiple theories in play at the same time and use your imagination when figuring out where to look. My knowledge of finance makes me good at what I do.

Ilyssa Panitz: How do you start looking for the information a client is seeking?

Philip Segal: You start from the beginning. We turn over every piece of public information we can on a person…