Cpl. Ray Melder was the go-to guy for behavior profiling, "getting inside" the bad guy's head, then getting him to talk.

Trooper Jerry Markle was the money man, able to find a financial needle in a haystack of false-start computer filings and fraudulent paperwork.

Trooper Paul Epps was the intelligence officer, as comfortable coaxing data from a computer as going undercover to dig dirt on drug-dealing gangs.

This triple-threat trio of retired state police officers who found friendship at the Butler state police barracks and then forged it on the basketball court are performing an encore of sorts.

All in their late 40s, they said they were ready to retire from the state police this year but were too young to hang up their law enforcement hats and the "Gone fishin' " sign.

So, they no longer wear a badge, but they're carrying licenses as the founders, owners and employees of Advanced Investigations Group, a Butler-based private detective agency.

"I'd say we're having some fun,'' said Mr. Melder, who retired in April as supervisor of the criminal investigation assessment unit at Troop D Butler, which encompasses the Butler, Kittanning, Beaver, New Castle and Mercer state police barracks. As such, he was the head criminal investigator for the troop and the supervisor of what law enforcement circles know as "behavior crimes" -- primarily, homicide and rapes.

A resident of Connoquenessing Township with his wife, Cathy, and three children, Mr. Melder, 48, grew up in Cranberry always wanting to be a state police officer. After graduating from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1980 with a degree in criminology, he entered the state police academy and became an officer at the age of 21 -- the youngest in the state at the time.

There were hard days and sad days as he climbed the state police ranks, but he always felt a satisfaction as a state police officer.

Still, as he and his new partners came closer to the 25-year point where they would achieve the best retirement package they could, they started thinking about "trying something different," as Mr. Melder described it. And, as they always did, they talked to each other about the possibilities.

It wasn't too hard to slip in a chit-chat every once in a while. Mr. Melder and Mr. Epps actually shared an office at the Butler state police barracks for several years and the three enjoyed playing recreational basketball with each other.

In fact, in their 25-plus-year careers, the three worked together in the Butler barracks for at least 15 years. During that time, they had become good friends in the office, close friends on the basketball court, and even closer friends in their private lives, eventually including their families in their circle of friendship. Misters Markle and Epps are high school basketball coaches and, as such, have coached Mr. Melder's children. Mr. Melder is a basketball officiator.

Mr. Epps, 48, who lives in Butler Township with his wife, Dorothea, with whom he raised two children, said the close relationship he enjoys with his private detective partners is fueling the new business, which began this summer.

"Everything just clicks,'' he said.

Growing up in Uniontown, Mr. Epps is a 1981 graduate of Waynesburg College, now Waynesburg University, with a degree in finance. He decided to enter the state police academy the next year at the suggestion of his uncle, a city policeman in Uniontown. Mr. Epps was ready to marry his high school sweetheart and was looking for a good job with good benefits and thought the state police force fit the bill.

It worked out. After putting in a few years as a patrol officer, he became a criminal investigator and, at the time of his retirement, was in the troop intelligence unit. "It was a good job,'' he said.

Each of the three men started with the state police about the same time, all initially working as patrol officers then rising to criminal investigators before pursing their individual specialties.

At the time of their retirements in April, Mr. Melder and Mr. Epps were stationed in Butler while Mr. Markle, who retired in June, was based in Harmar. Though one of the threesome was a half-hour away, they still got together on the basketball court for fun.

Mr. Melder and Mr. Epps used down time in the office to dream a bit about the future then discussed their ideas with Mr. Markle. The possibilities ran the gamut, even including landscaping. "We like the outdoors,'' Mr. Melder said, laughing.

Ultimately, they settled on a hybrid of law enforcement: private investigations.

"You still get the taste of the police-type mentality. You still get some investigation. That's what we know and like,'' Mr. Epps said.

Mr. Markle, 49, and his wife, Sandy, have three children. They live in Center. He was in a regional organized crime investigation unit based in Harmar at the time of his retirement from the state police.

Growing up in Butler, he was a 1980 graduate of IUP with degrees in political science and accounting. He went to the state police academy about six weeks after graduation.

"It's what I always wanted to do but I didn't know if I could get into the state police academy at the time,'' he said. His fears were unfounded.

As it was with his colleagues, he began as a patrol officer then became a criminal investigator, but his state police career took him from Butler to Harmar in 1996 when he joined the organized crime unit. Though he no longer saw his buddies at the office, he continued to see them on the basketball court and in their after-hours lives as personal friends.

"We have so many common threads that kept us close,'' Mr. Markle said.

Now, the threesome is sharing ownership in a business that provides an outlet that taps into their expertise, he said.

"It made sense to retire. A new contract season was coming up and we had maxed out [in terms of the retirement benefits we could accrue] but I knew I wasn't ready to sit around and do nothing every day,'' Mr. Markle said. "We each enjoyed our jobs and wanted to use those skills we had developed in our retirement."

Each brings something unique to the private detective table.

As an organized crime investigator, Mr. Markle worked many embezzlement cases which involved tracking financial records, both computer and handheld. "I tracked the money,'' he said.

Mr. Melder is court-certified as an expert in a range of criminal investigation techniques, from blood spatter to interrogation. He was a fixture in the major homicide investigations of the region, spending weeks each year as an expert witness in prosecution cases.

Mr. Epps specialized in child abuse and sexual assault cases, and was an intelligence officer, which plugged him into the undercover underworld of illegal narcotics and gangs.

They each share equally in the detective agency, with Mr. Melder as president; Mr. Markle as vice president; and Mr. Epps as secretary.

To date, they have tracked philandering husbands; served papers for attorneys; probed traffic accidents; conducted asset searches; checked backgrounds; researched assets; uncovered property liens; gathered evidence; interviewed witnesses; and surveilled.

There are about three dozen people and companies licensed as private detectives in Butler County. Though most have some type of law enforcement experience in their background, none quite fit the profile of the Melder-Markle-Epps threesome.

"You could make a TV series about these guys,'' said Butler County District Attorney Randa Clark, who as a county prosecutor has known each of the men for years, often working with them as witnesses in court cases. "They are the best of the best."

She said she's not surprised they would retire from law enforcement then begin a new enterprise that lives on the edges of their old careers.

"They've always wanted to get the bad guy. They just can't walk away from that,'' she said.