Legal Revue

Reprinted from "The Legal Brief Revue, Enforcement & Investigation"

Richard "Dick" Price is a true super sleuth when it comes to recovering missing and abducted children.  Spanning his 30 year career, Price has recovered and returned over 100 children, finding them in every corner of the world.  He is a specialist and considered an expert in child recovery, unsolved homicides, missing persons, runaways, and reuniting lost loves. Price is a licensed private investigator in the state of Florida, with his international office head-quartered in Denver, Colorado.  There is not a week that goes by that Price isn't flying somewhere across the United States to consult with new clients and law enforcement agencies. "It's become my specialty," says Price, "reuniting children with their custodial parents or solving a cold case murder really makes my day."  And if paraphrasing tough-guy Clint Eastwood isn't enough, Price has been hailed by President Ronald Reagan as "the best of the best."  A real Top Gun, Price has been compared in the media to Humphrey Bogart's super sleuth character, Sam spade, of the famous film "The Maltese Falcon" and the infamous James Bond 007, except Price says he doesn't like martinis. Like Bond he has an arsenal of every imaginable piece of super spy paraphernalia and has used his top secret equipment and ingenuity in as may countries throughout the world as Bond has in his movies. He has also been compared to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police where the Mountie always gets its man (or in some cases woman).  To list his accomplishments would take a large book and of course there are several of those written about him already. As a former elected member of the Florida House of Representatives, this man is well connected not only in the US, but around the world. 

Price is an ordained "Knight Commander" of the world renowned Knights of Malta. The Knights of Malta and their Maltese Cross, span nine centuries of history and have risen to become the most honored symbol of ideals, valor and faith to mankind. 

Today the Maltese Cross is awarded only to the most eminent persons in the fields of religion, arts, science, literature, government philanthropy, commerce and heroism.  Price wears his Maltese Cross with great distinction. From dignitaries to homeless folk, this "gumshoe" gets around.  His ability to adjust his larger than life character like a chameleon, to the nice guy next door, seems to be the key to his unprecedented success.  "Yes," he agrees, "versatility is important."  But it's his connections, built over a lifetime of "mission impossible" cases, that make him the Top Gun of the parental abduction or missing person's "war." After spending 10 minutes with the man, one gets the distinct impression that nothing is impossible for him. 

When asked how he feels about organizations that help parents and kids hideout in underground networks, Price snaps "those people play judge, jury, hangman an God.  What I do is simply enforce the law once they break it, I have not sympathy.  My job is to bring in the fugitive and get the kids back where the law ways they belong.  And let the courts sort out right from wrong." As a former elected law enforcement official in the State of Florida responsible only to the Governor, Price does not mince words about the in's and out's of business.  "If a custodial parent wants me to accept their case, and locate their children, they have to understand that is is an expensive undertaking."  However, Price has always worked his share of "Pro Bono" cases to assist victim parents and nationwide child find organizations to locate the "abductor" and the missing child. The director of one such child find organizations reported, " Thank God for men like Mr. Price, that are wiling to give their time and finances to help a parent in a needy time recover their child." Looking over the collection of media memorabilia on his cases is like viewing a who's who list from the United Nation's archives.

Photos from one case reveal two camels tied together, Price on one and a six-year-old boy seated with a member of his Recovery Team, a former CIA Agent, on the other.  Both outfitted in sheik's clothing emerging from the desert near the pyramids of the Middle East city of Cairo, Egypt.  Just a day at the office for this Top Gun private eye. 

He is one of the few investigators ever to recover abducted children from the countries of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Africa, Europe, and Central America. What drives him?  "The challenge," he barks. "Turning the seemingly impossible into a case closed is what I live for.  I eat, sleep, and breathe the chase.  It's conclusion brings me a feeling of satisfaction that can't be put into words."  After 30 minutes of conversation, Price makes you feel you could climb Mount Everest if he were your guide. His dream he says is to open the largest child find organization in the country and help victims and parents that cannot afford the expensive costs of recovering their children. Out of all the media attention Price has received, the most elaborate description of him was written by author John Dillmann in the shocking, true crime novel "Deadly Weekend: A True Story of Obsession and Murder." This story of obsession and murder started in St. Petersburg, Florida with a multi-millionaire doctor of anesthesiology, Dr. Mark Shepard of St. Anthony's Hospital was reported missing in New Orleans, Louisiana. First listed as a missing person and then as a brutal homicide, the case was investigated and solved by Price when all others in law enforcement failed to dig up much of anything.  The book is well worth a trip to the library.  The first hard copy edition was sold out within 90 days and can only be found today in the libraries. 

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