Staff Writer

The location is a classic gumshoe haunt - invisible but right under your nose.

Pass through a smudged glass door to the right of the glitzy Art Deco marquee of the State Cinema on Hope Street in Stamford. Mount the yellow, somewhat seedy stairway surrounded by the scent of frying onions.

Enter the sneaky, underhanded and captivating world of the private detective.

Two local private investigators on Thursday will open The Spy's the Limit, a retail store that will rent, sell and install surveillance devices sparsely available to the average Joe.

Vito Colucci and Al Dressler - who conducted investigations for Woody Allen, Gary Wendt and Michael Skakel - decided the shop would showcase the state-of-the-art equipment.

Colucci, who became involved in investigation in 1969 as a narcotics and organized-crime officer for the Stamford Police Department, opened Colucci Investigations in Stamford in 1988.

"The business has changed so much over the years," Colucci said. "Back then, it was mostly surveillance of husbands and wives."

But the use of hidden cameras has exploded, he said. Parents now ask Colucci to hide cameras in their homes to ferret out abuse or neglect by caretakers. Businesses hire the company to install cameras in their public areas, usually when they expect theft.

One Stamford firm had more than 40 cameras installed in its building. Weeks later, the cameras picked up someone posing as an information technology staff member who took out computer hard drives. The thief allegedly took valuable financial information off the drives.

Investigators will frequently install cameras in clocks, videocassette recorders and clock radios in the rooms of nursing-home residents. The residents' children can use the slow-recording tapes to prove or allay fears of abuse or neglect by employees.

Cameras can be hidden in numerous places. "I love the thermostat the best, myself," Colucci said.

Ordinary people may have some unglamorous and practical uses for the shop's wares. Consider a clever device these investigators fondly call "the crib cam."

A tiny camera clamps on the rung of a crib and watches a baby's every move and records sound. The parent can tote a wireless receiver to another room or outside. The receiver sends a clear image of the child to a miniature screen.

Improved technology has brought down the price of the cameras. Five years ago, it may have cost thousands to put cameras in a home or business, but now the price can range in the hundreds. The crib cam, for instance, sells for less than $200.

The diminutive size of these cameras, some no bigger than a quarter, makes it that much easier to be a snoop.

Gone are the days when a detective waits hours outside a restaurant for a husband or wife to emerge with a lover.

These days, Dressler secretes a camera in a canvas bag or fanny pack, stands with other patrons, drink in hand, and records the kisses, caresses and gestures of a tryst.

The shop does not sell bugging equipment, because in Connecticut it's illegal to record a person speaking without their knowledge. But Colucci Investigations does offer "de-bugging" services.

If a person suspects their phones or home is being tapped, the firm has equipment to find bugging devices. Instead of ripping them out, Colucci will work with police to set up a sting. A bugger is lured to a location with a tip on the phone line then confronted by police about why they showed up there.

They also rent and sell tracking devices that can be stuck with Velcro beneath a dashboard and show where a person has driven the car. A Windows-based computer program displays the route on a street map.

Only the owner of a car may plant the device in a car. Husbands or wives often use them to confirm their spouse's whereabouts. Business owners rent them to monitor delivery drivers.

Also available are Internet monitors, which have been used to let parents know what sites their children visit. They also have been used by spouses to learn about Internet-spawned affairs.

The shop sells voice changers, and night-vision binoculars, goggles, and cameras are on the way. There's an assortment of novelty items - authentic Vietnam and Gulf War service medals and replicas of police and law enforcement agencies' badges and patches. None of the badges or patches are from local police agencies.

"Being an ex-cop, I'd hate to have a cop come in and say, 'Hey, Vito, why are you selling our badges?'" Colucci said.

Colucci is confident that the retail shop, like his investigative company, will soar.

"People tend to imagine things that aren't even going on," he said. "It's because it's the information age, and information is so much more accessible."

Often an investigation proves a person's fears to be false.

"But that's good, too," he said, since it puts the suspicious person's mind to rest.

Colucci said he never worries that anyone is watching him

"I guess if I was doing something wrong, yes, I would worry," he responded with a wink.