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Parallel construction is the unlawful law enforcement process of building a parallel, or separate, evidentiary basis for an investigation in order to conceal how an investigation was actually conducted.
For example, an intelligence agency can collect incriminating digital evidence from a phone without a warrant, and then conduct a house raid to seize the phone where that evidence can be “discovered” so that it will not be thrown out at trial because it was obtained illegally.
A particular form of parallel construction is evidence laundering, in which one police officer illegally collects evidence and then “washes” it by passing it to a second officer who develops it and turns it over to prosecutors.
Used in tactics: Incrimination