PRIVATE EYE
Russ Kolins has lived the kind of life you usually only read about in books. In fact, you may have seen his name in a book or more. A member of the Pyramid Club in Philadelphia, Kolins left college to join the Marines, landing in an intelligence unit. After returning from Vietnam in 1969, he parlayed that investigation and recon experience into a career as a private investigator. “Every case is as different as a fingerprint,” says the president of Russell Kolins Associates. “My specialty is criminal defense, so I’m not out there spying on cheating spouses. I’m fortunate enough to be able to be selective about my clients, so I don’t get those 3 a.m. calls about someone looking for their husband or wife.” The one thing that all his clients are looking for, however, is justice. Much of his work involves insurance companies and corporations, but he also has been at the center of some high-profile cases. After a professor named Jay Smith was convicted of the 1979 murder of a high school teacher, Kolins maintained Smith’s innocence; the Supreme Court ultimately overturned the conviction. It became the subject of Joseph Wambaugh’s best-seller, Echoes in the Darkness — one of seven books Kolins has been featured in — and a television movie. Kolins also played a pivotal role in the famous Jeffrey MacDonald murder case, which also became fodder for a book and TV movie. Through the years, he’s seen it all. “The only thing that surprises me,” he says, “is that I got into this business in the first place.” — Paula Felps

Photography by Nadine Rovner/Wonderful Machine.