Burn Notice Season 5 Episode 4

Michael: (voice-over) It's important to keep your guard up at the end of an operation. Once you've found your target, won their trust, and made a deal, it's natural to want to relax a bit. But the fact is, that's exactly the time to be most careful. When money's on the line and things go wrong, they tend to go very, very wrong.

Michael: (voice-over) To secure a location, police clear rooms one by one from the ground up. It's a thorough procedure but slow. It gives you the opportunity to cover your tracks, wipe down fingerprints, pick up any shell casings, and steal the office access logs. But it only leaves one option for escaping. So when your back's against the wall and time is running out, there's nothing like seeing an old friend.

Michael: (voice-over) When in the field, it's the little things that kill you; a getaway car that won't start, a jammed gun that won't fire, or a maintenance man who won't leave. When setbacks happen, you improvise.

Michael: (voice-over) People tend to think shredding documents is the same as destroying them. Actually, it's more like taking the pieces from a hundred different Jigsaw puzzles and mixing them up. Putting them back together is just a matter of time and perseverance or having access to the right software.

Michael: (voice-over) When someone's in a killing mood, it doesn't help appealing to their sympathy. You're better off taking their rage and redirecting it at someone else.

Michael: (voice-over) One way to break into a secure building is to commit a decoy crime first. Create an obvious situation that explains why an alarm was tripped, and people won't discover the real reason you stopped by.

Max: Now, would you focus on the task at hand? I don't want this thing blowing up in my face.
Michael: We're sabotaging an A.C. system. We're not defusing a bomb.
Max: Yeah, well, I've noticed that things have a tendency to blow up when you're around.

Michael: (voice-over) Vehicle counter-surveillance is very difficult if you're trying to be inconspicuous. If you're willing to be a little more obvious, on the other hand, it gets a lot easier. You can drive in circles, go the wrong direction on a one-way street, or just stop in the middle of the road.

Michael: (voice-over) Criminals who specialize in hacking are a special breed. They have the skills to find legitimate work, but they choose to steal instead. They're all about using their brains to dominate and control. That's why crafting a cover I.D. that will succeed with them is a challenge. They're not looking for an equal partner. They're looking for another loser to sneer at, so that's just what you give them.

Michael: (voice-over) In many ways, the more sophisticated a thief is, the easier they are to find. Anyone who gets a job under a fake name and uses stolen high-security access codes leaves a fat paper trail, which means, if they're smart, they have no intention of hanging around.

Michael: (voice-over) Seeing a project through to completion requires a certain level of obsessiveness. The problem is you can't turn it on and off. So you end up doing things no one else can understand, like sticking with an operation long after it's over or trying to fix a car you should have given up on years ago.

Max: You know the game. They steal secrets, we steal secrets. It's all good fun.
Michael: Until someone gets caught.
Max: Then we don't get caught.

Michael: (voice-over) Intelligence-agency field offices have to find a delicate balance between blending in and providing adequate security... which is why, whenever possible, they piggyback onto the facilities of fellow government agencies.

Michael: (voice-over) Pretending to be a belligerent drunk lets you get close to a target long enough to plant a tracker without them getting suspicious. Of course, if you plan on making a scene at a fancy hotel, you'd better be ready to pay the price.