I know, it's a real pain and can make progressing really difficult. I just keep trying to arrest people who appear on the lot at the same time or very soon after my detective arrives there. Although you do lose promotion progress trying to arrest the incorrect suspect you can make that loss back up by locking the perp away...eventually.
I've had the clues point to an elder, female, long sleeves, skirt, creative and the perp was young adult, male, t-shirt, jeans, loves outdoors. *sigh*
Another trick I found was to always introduce my detective to any potential perp that he is about to arrest. This seems to stop the bug where the perp does not travel back to the station with your detective from happening.