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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/48797
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Yes. Many cold cases (cases that remain unsolved and all leads provided by evidence have dried up) are kept alive by interested members of the public who want to find some closure to the victims, even if evidence does not exist to conclusively prove in trial or the criminal is deceased. Netflix has a good documentary series called "The Keepers" is about a group of women who are trying to solve a mystery surrounding the Murder of a beloved teacher and Nun at their Catholic High School in Baltimore and the group got together after accusations of sexual abuse by a priest at the same school and their own subsequent reveal of being victims (thinking they were alone). Most, if not all, former student investigators were all victims of the priest and through their shared experiences, have a working theory that the nun was murdered because one of the victims confided in her shortly before her murder (the priest in question died before he could be brought on any criminal charges).

Additionally, in the United States (and other common law nations) a civilian is allowed to detain someone they suspect is comitting a crime until such time that the police can to take the detained into custody (known as Citizen's arrest). Typically, this is if the criminal is seen in the act, but it can occur if the person is holding them against their will under enough evidence for the cops to make an arrest while the cops take their time arriving. Additionally, in the United States, the legal concept of "Castle Doctrine" allows for self defense against illegal intruders on your property even in States where "Stand your ground laws" do not exist for self defense on public property and extends to anyone who is invited to be on your property so long as the intruder is known to not be invited (So Kevin from Home Alone was well within his rights to set traps for the Wet Bandits, and many doctors have agreed that by the time both intruders were in the house, the injuries sustained would have prevented them from getting up to the first floor, if not outright kill them). At no point in the film is Kevin implausibly aware of facts that lead him to conclude the Bandits are up to no good (even though McCullcan seemed to have a talent for playing kids who were capable of behaving way more mature than a kid his age, nothing with respect to the bandits is overly out of the bounds of plausible for a 6-8 year old (I forget his age, it's been the better part of a year since I last watched it).

Original score: 1