Ernest Barth

From an early interview with Tom Grant around 1995

"Ben and I had actually just worked on another case a few months earlier where a mother had reported her 18-year-old daughter missing and from our initial interviews with the mother and the boyfriend we we were a little suspicious of that and sure enough that girl ended up dead in a dumpster. We'd just come off of that case and now we have another case where somebody's missing... we walk in the door and she starts lying to us about all kinds of stuff... by this time we knew it was Kurt Cobain, he was a multi-millionaire so as we left and were walking down the hall I told Ben Kugman we were going to document this case really well"

From Tom Grant and Mathew Richer's book "The Mysterious death of Kurt Cobain: Suicide or Murder?"

Before Death-

 As soon as we got onto the elevator, I turned to Ben and said: "This whole thing smells rotten. From now on, we're going to record every conversation we have in this case. I want us to carefully document every single thing that happens."

After Death- 

I flew back to Los Angeles the following afternoon, but before I went to the airport, I met Ernie Barth for breakfast at a diner near Pike Place Market in order to pick his brain, but mostly for the purpose of calming him down.

"What the fuck Tom! Why weren't we watching the house!" he screamed at me.

"Calm down, Ernie. You didn't do anything wrong."

"We could have found the guy if we were watching the house."

"Ernie, you and I aren't cops anymore. We have to do whatever the client wants, and the client didn't want us watching the house. It's that simple."

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Suspicion of individuals from earlier case proved to be true 

therefore 

Recorded conversations with Courtney Love over whom he had suspicion over.

For what other purpose would Grant record conversations if not to prevent another tragedy?

To convict someone after the fact? or to save a life and then convict that person? 

Why didn't he fly up to Seattle himself right away? He's already at the point of having to record everything due to suspicion. 

His claim is that he couldn't afford it. He had just gotten paid $500 from Courtney Love. 

He could have stopped at the lobby of the Peninsula or gone to the next building over and asked to speak to one of the CAA agents who are invested in the entertainment industry, Ben could have meanwhile alerted Seattle authorities of a high-profile celebrity who is reported to be suicidal. 

As a concerned citizen, you don't prevent any investigator from taking it upon himself to check the residence of an individual with a high risk of suicide, especially if you have no Private Investigator License in that state and the other Investigator does. 

Tom Grant, suspecting a client of possibly planning a murder and preventing a licensed PI from doing the right thing - saving a life - is in my opinion - assisting in the murder.