"I enjoy what I do. It's rewarding. It's fun. It's just nothing like portrayed on TV and in the movies," said Lax, president and owner of Inquisitor Inc.
Marking its 30th anniversary recently, Inquisitor offers a full range of investigative services in such areas as insurance fraud and corporate theft but handles few domestic cases.
Lax is personally drawn to criminal defense work, especially death-penalty cases. Before working on a murder-conviction appeal in the late 1980s, Lax said he didn't give much thought to capital punishment.
"If you would have asked me back then, I would have said, 'Sure, I'm for the death penalty,'" he said. "But then I started looking at the death penalty, and I realized how unfair it was.
"Law enforcement and (district attorneys) usually do have the right person, but sometimes they don't. Innocent people are convicted, and guilty people go free. It's definitely lopsided. If someone has a good attorney, they can buy a very good defense."
Lax has investigated -- sometimes on a volunteer basis -- numerous high-profile capital murder cases, including the West Memphis Three.
In 2006, Lax was honored by the Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers for his "extraordinary work in the arena of capital defense investigations." He has worked cases as far away as California, Montana and Hawaii.
