INTERVIEW: Former homicide detective investigates past tragedies on ‘The Dead Files’

The Dead Files, the hit Travel Channel series returning July 12 with new episodes, follows the unlikely pairing of former NYPD homicide detective Steve DiSchiavi and physical medium Amy Allan as they investigate unexplained paranormal phenomena. DiSchiavi sticks to the facts and research, while Allan relies on her medium skills to look into each case. The goal for both TV personalities is the same: bring closure to a family by solving the case once and for all.

For DiSchiavi, the pathway to The Dead Files began with an ABC documentary when he was working for the NYPD. “When I was on the NYPD, ABC News did a documentary called NYPD 24/7, and I was the featured detective on the first episode that featured the homicide squad,” he said recently during a phone interview. “So someone in Hollywood saw it, and I got a phone call asking me if I was interested in doing television. I’m not an actor. I didn’t go out looking for this.”

DiSchiavi thought that first phone call was a joke. He actually hung up a few times and then realized it may be a truthful call. He eventually filmed a couple of pilots, but the networks weren’t taking the bait, apparently thinking he was “too New York.”

Jim Casey, TV producer, came around and approached DiSchiavi about putting his investigative skills to work on the paranormal show. The former homicide detective needed some convincing. “I basically turned him down the first couple of times. And he said, ‘You know, you really should meet Amy, and we’ll figure out a way to do this where you’re not really involved in any kind of ghost-hunting,’ which I didn’t want nothing to do with. Then when I realized the concept, and I met Amy and saw what she was capable of, I was in for a pound.”

Although DiSchiavi doesn’t directly work with Allan on the show, he’s appreciative of her work. The two tackle cases on each episode separately and then pool their findings at the end to see how it turns out.

“I’ve always been an open-minded skeptic,” he said. “I would never say there’s no such thing as the paranormal; that’s kind of ignorant. But I had worked with some psychics when I was a homicide detective, and they didn’t really impress me much. So I didn’t have a lot of faith in the field, but then when I saw what Amy was capable of and her abilities, then I was sold.”

The new season will feature an episode on a case in Florida City, Fla., where the family is so terrified of the “paranormal” activity in their house they need to sleep in the same room at night. This episode and others like it should make for a “very intense season.”

“I say that every season, but it just seems that the more and more we go on, and we just finished our 73^rd episode, the clients, what they’re going through, is a little bit more intense. My part of it, the research, is basically the same as far as what I do, but a lot of the history I uncovered was pretty shocking. And Amy, on her end, encountered a lot of things she’s never seen before this season. And she’s had some pretty intense walks where there was a couple of times she couldn’t even complete the walk, and then she had to go try and finish up.”

Here’s another highlight from the upcoming season: “For this season, Amy happened to see a death in a bed and breakfast that was pretty recent, and I mean recent in the last 10 years. And she nailed it to the way he did it, how he was found. I mean it was incredible, and I know for a fact she didn’t have any prior knowledge of this. So when stuff like that happens, I sit there, and I look at her sometimes. I’m like, how the hell do you do this? I mean it’s incredible.”

DiSchiavi sees himself as a supporting team member to Allan’s work, but that doesn’t mean they always see eye to eye. This fact, the homicide detective said, gives the show credibility. “I mean we don’t try to put a square peg into a round hole,” he said. “If it matches, it matches. If it don’t, it don’t. But probably 95 percent of the time, something in my research comes in connection with what she saw on her walk, which blows my mind every week.”

The preparation for each episode is extensive. DiSchiavi researches a location up to a month before filming begins. Once he lands on the ground, he has already lined up a team of historians, genealogists and police officers to assist. After his interviews are complete, he doesn’t know where the path will lead him. This open investigation means the team is under great pressure to crack the case within a rigorous timeframe (shooting takes seven days per episode).

No matter what the outcome might be, it’s a safe bet that DiSchiavi won’t be religiously watching reruns once it airs. “I do not like seeing myself on TV,” he said with a laugh. “I only watch the first episodes when they first air, and that’s it. … All my friends and family watch. They’re very supportive, and the guys I worked with, they always break my chops. ‘Oh, you look fat on TV. I like that suit. I didn’t like you in this suit.’ Stuff like that.”

DiSchiavi was on the NYPD for 22 years, with his last 12 years working in the grim reality of the homicide division. He’s been retired for eight years and had a run as a private investigator. His work on The Dead Files has continued his career into the interesting field of inquiry.

“If you would told me 10 years ago I would be doing this, I would have bet my mortgage that it would never happen,” he said. “I mean I never wanted to be on TV; it’s just something that happened.”

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com

• The Dead Files returns with new episodes 10 p.m. Saturday, July 12 on the Travel Channel. Click here for more information.