What is a “skip” in the world of Private Investigation? Is it the same skip in “skip trace”? Thanks.
My late father ran a credit bureau. In that biz, a skip was a guy who moved away, leaving a passel of unpaid bills.
Or, similar, could be someone who has skipped payments, usually on a car, about to repossessed.
Generally in PI lingo a skip tracer is a bail bondsman or someone working on behalf of a bondsman tracing someone who has skipped bail.
An excellent resource for similar slang may be found here: Twists, Slugs and Roscoes: A Glossary of Hardboiled Slang. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll ankle back to my boiler. I left a hot skirt in it and her gams go all the way up to her chin.
I retract my earlier post. Call it memory failure, I had the right source/context but the wrong details.
A “skip” is someone who has skipped out, left town.
My source is Joe Gores’ book DEAD SKIP. Gores now writes mysteries (and wonderful they are, too) but he began his career as an actual real-life detective.