[2014] Eyes Pried Open: Rookie FBI Agent

by Vincent Sellers

  I met the other members of my squad throughout the day as they trickled in from performing various investigative actives; the irregularity of their arrivals and departures signaled a job that was not the traditional nine-to-five. Throughout my time in the FBI, I saw that FBI employees are generally personable, honest people with varying backgrounds; all are people who wanted to “do the right thing” in becoming FBI agents and worked hard to get there. But they are completed dedicated to their professional lives, with little left for the personal side. Out of my entire squad of eight people, only one was married with a family, besides me. Working for the FBI generally does not offer a lifestyle conducive to family life, at least not in a traditional sense. Of course, there are plenty of agents with fantastic families and wonderful children, but their families have to be flexible and make allowances for the law enforcement profession. I have heard of agents who not only missed birthday parties, but missed the actual birth of their children. By nature a reactive violent crime squad is one of the most difficult ones to combine with family life, so my experience was extreme compared to that of most FBI agents. With the varying hours required for responding to crimes and with numerous late-night or early-morning arrests, I came to long for a repetitive and structured schedule. And I came to greatly appreciate the sacrifices that agents make for our country at the expense of themselves and their families.

  For the remainder of that first day, I unpacked my equipment, established my computer and email accounts, and familiarized myself with additional San Diego procedures and operations. The paperwork, phone lists, and forms were all familiar territory for someone who had previously served time in a corporate cube.

  Towards the end of the day, word spread that a lead had come in regarding the location of a suspect who had robbed a bank on the previous Friday. There was the potential for an arrest that night, and all hands were needed to be on standby. I was already exhausted and felt like the day had lasted a week. I knew that Jennifer was anxiously waiting for me to hear how my first day went. I knew she would be looking forward to telling me about her first day by herself, and what she had learned about our exciting new neighborhood in Southern California. I headed home after my busy first day, but with the knowledge that I might be called to come back in to help with an arrest.

  As would occur many more times during service as an FBI agent, I received a call that the FBI was proceeding with an arrest that evening, and that I needed to come back into the office and further assist with the operation. I quickly finished my meal, kissed Jennifer goodbye, and climbed back into my car and headed back to the FBI field office. What I elected not to tell Jennifer was that according to the FBI source's information, the bank robber had been jailed for serious offenses on two other occasions. In California there is a “three strikes” law that mandates a lifetime sentence for any three-time felony offender. This bank robber apparently understood the gravity of his situation, and had conveyed to the FBI source that he would not ever go back to jail and would “go down fighting.” He had used a handgun in the commission of the robbery, and although he did not shoot anyone during robbery, clearly there was a significantly heightened risk of violence for this particular arrest.

  As evening approached, the FBI agents met up with the San Diego Police Department in an empty parking lot a couple of miles from where the subject was believed to be located. On-site I was issued a San Diego Police Department radio, and was quickly introduced to a number of San Diego Police Department detectives and officers. They began to go over their operational procedures, and where everyone would be located for surveillance and a possible arrest. I was told to strap on my bulletproof vest and be ready for anything. I nervously strapped on my vest and was preoccupied with ensuring that my gun and handcuffs were securely fastened to my belt. I closed my trunk lid, could not locate my car keys in any of my pants pockets, and convinced myself that I had locked my keys in my trunk. I held my poker face and kept this feeling of absolute panic and terror to myself, and fortunately it turned out that the car doors were not locked and the keys were in my center console.

  After allowing my pulse to slow to a somewhat normal pace, I had a surreal feeling of observing myself from an almost third-person perspective. Not only was I put into a situation in which I was working with an entirely new group of “real” FBI agents, but also “real” San Diego Police Department personnel. Up to this point my interaction with any law enforcement officers had been the result of being pulled over for speeding tickets. Not unlike most law-abiding citizens, I held a combination of fear and respect for these people, and it was hard to digest that I was now one of their peers. I had to come to terms with the fact that I was now susceptible to the same dangers as my peers, which included serious injury or death if a situation went awry. My years of following law-enforcement stories and FBI training had enlightened me on the inherent dangers of the profession, but also had taught me that the risks could be controlled and minimized. However, I was walking into one of the most risky scenarios in law-enforcement: the arrest of an armed, desperate criminal who is facing life in prison and has nothing to lose. The thought of having actual bullets flying at me, or the possibility of having to return fire, struck a primal chord. This chord would reverberate on levels deep within me until I no longer worked for the FBI.

  After the group's briefing, I turned on my police and FBI radios, and took a position a few blocks from the house that was believed to be holding the subject. I listened to radio traffic and waited for several hours, which felt like days. The agents did not want the bank robber to know that we were on his trail, so the surveillance of the property involved multiple drive-bys by different agents and vehicles so that we would maintain our element of surprise. After listening to radio traffic and learning that everyone had already driven by in separate vehicles, I volunteered to take my turn and drive by the property to view the premises and see what additional intelligence I could determine. I was instructed to drive by, confirm the license plate of a vehicle in the driveway that was believed to be the subject's, and look for any movement or activity within the house. I did not know the precise location of the house, and was unfamiliar with the streets and neighborhood of this operation. I put my car into gear, rolled around the block, and then drove by the house that was described on the radio. However, I was not sure that I was even looking at the right house due to the darkness and lack of clearly visible house numbers. This was shortly before the widespread use of smartphones; I certainly could have benefitted from Google’s “street view,” but at the time I was using an old paper map of San Diego, which did not provide much help in this case. I thought that I saw an SUV that had been previously described as belonging to the subject, but I could not even provide 100% positive identification of that. Considering that I could not be sure that I was looking at the right house or vehicle, I certainly did not get to view the license plate or notice activity within the house. So I mustered up my most confident “FBI agent” voice and radioed back to the team that I believed I had seen the vehicle, but was unable to confirm the license plate. I did not mention that I was unsure if I had even seen the correct house. I felt uncomfortable and completely out of my element.

  Shortly before midnight we finally broke off the surveillance after none of us were able to positively identify the subject. I drove home, with just enough time to grab a snack and roll into the bed. Before I feel asleep, which was difficult to do quickly because I had just experienced an intense and adrenaline-inducing event, I thought about how I would be waking up again in a few hours to unknown adventures that awaited me the next day. I had completed my first full day, which was mentally and physically draining, without any recovery time before the next day. I felt like a complete wimp for the first time in my life, and began to seriously wonder if I had made a huge mistake in joining the FBI. A part of me was already longing for my old life where I was comfortable in my tiny corporate cube doing Excel sp
readsheets or process maps, and not worrying about whether I might be shot and never get to see my family again.

  CHAPTER 18

  First Arrest

  The second day would turn out to be just as frantic as the previous one. By the end of the day I would have my first arrest statistic credited to my name. This was most definitely not because I was an outstanding agent who arrested a criminal single-handedly; no, my first and many of my future arrest stats were largely due to the generosity of my fellow agents who “shared the wealth.” By crediting me with arrests, this accelerated the pace for completion of my new agent training log and served to paint a picture of an experienced and versatile squad. As with any organization, measurement and statistics are important when it comes down to budgets, funding, and performance reviews. The FBI is no different; statistics, some meaningless, are tracked and reported by agent, squad, and field office. The compiling of statistics serves multiple purposes: many agents strive to be the best agent on the best squad, in the best division. By nature, FBI agents are incredibly driven and competitive, sometimes to a fault.

  After making my way downtown in the morning (which included two added detours due to my failure to take correct exits) and finding a parking spot in the mall parking garage, I strolled over to my new FBI office. Shortly after walking through the door, I was grabbed by a fellow agent on my squad, Special Agent Mark Landry. Mark asked if I would like to help him with an easy arrest that technically would occur while the prisoner was already in the state prison. In this case, a prisoner was about to be released, but had an outstanding federal prison sentence which would begin immediately after his state time was served.

  As a new agent I thought this arrest would be fun, interesting, and within my comfort zone since it would be a controlled and relatively safe arrest scenario. I made sure I had my cuffs and my gun. All we needed to do was show up at the door of the state prison, handcuff our guy, and transport him to the federal prison.

  Mark and I departed for the George Mason California State prison, located near the border of the United States and Mexico in a region composed of mountains and desert. After about a forty-five minute drive, we reached the prison. There was nothing else out in that area, except for a law enforcement firing range located next to the prison. This turned out to be where most of the law enforcement agencies in the San Diego vicinity, including the FBI, held their firearms training exercises. This served as a deterrent to crime, a reminder for the prisoners on the inside of what law enforcement is practicing and is capable of on the outside.

  As Mark and I pulled up to the prison, I could not help but recall images from movies. Aside from a tour of Alcatraz, I had never been to a prison. Cool Hand Luke, Brubaker, and The Shawshank Redemption formed my impression and expectations of what a prison is like. The prison we were visiting was famous for housing celebrities such as Tom Sizemore, the talented but troubled Hollywood actor who had played a bank robber in the movie Heat. This film also had served as a weekend screening favorite with FBI agents at the FBI Academy. I was grateful to be going into the prison as a law-enforcement officer, rather than someone checking in for an extended and involuntary stay.

  This was also my first exposure to the rigid rules and regulations of prisons. Each prison is different, but most have a policy that does not allow law enforcement officials to bring weapons into the facility. This simple rule eliminates the risk of a careless act resulting in a prisoner gaining access to a weapon. We left our weapons locked up in the trunk of our car. Although I knew that this was an understandable and logical policy, I could not help but feel vulnerable as we walked through the door.

  After waiting for about twenty minutes, we were summoned to a holding room where we could see our subject on the other side of a glass barrier. We went through a door that led us to the other side of the barrier, where we informed our subject that we were arresting him on federal human trafficking charges due to his smuggling illegal immigrants across the border into the United States. The subject was a Hispanic male in his mid-30s of average size and weight. Over time I would come to see numerous Hispanic males who were being prosecuted on this same charge. Human trafficking is done hundreds of times per day in the San Diego border region. I was getting my first taste of border-related crime. I would come to see San Diego and the surrounding border area as being the true “Wild West.”

  Mark allowed me to be the arresting officer. I issued my standard FBI commands for the prisoner: “Place your hands behind your back, turn around slowly, spread your legs, look to the side, and do not move!” This was it! This was my moment. I was an actual FBI agent placing handcuffs on an actual criminal. Nobody would yell, “Cut!” This was not a movie or an amusement park attraction; I was actually arresting someone.

  It felt good to place handcuffs on a criminal. All of that hard work, all of the dreaming since I was young, and all of the positive choices I had made in life came down to this moment of action. The overall experience was not exactly what I originally pictured before joining the FBI; FBI agents in my mind had been the people who worked in terrorism cases or nailed Mafia families in New York. I was arresting someone on illegal alien smuggling charges, which made me feel more like a US Border Patrol agent than an FBI agent. The lines of responsibility for the FBI to work border crimes would continue to demonstrate ambiguity over the coming months; DEA, Border Patrol, local law enforcement, and the FBI all work the same type of cases: crime that originates directly or indirectly from illegal drug and human trade between the United States and Mexico.

  After completing the prison discharge paperwork, we escorted the prisoner outside to our car. I retrieved our weapons from the car trunk as Mark kept an eye on our subject. Mark was driving and knew how to get to the federal prison, so I stayed in the back seat with the prisoner, which is standard FBI protocol. We radioed the San Diego office, provided our time, mileage, and destination, and then departed the state prison. Documentation of departure time and arrival time is an important part of the standard operating procedures for the FBI, because this protocol eliminates the potential for false accusations from inmates who claim to be taken on detours and tortured. The information is recorded at the FBI office, so dates, time, and distance show the chain of custody for a prisoner and greatly reduces the potential for charges of inappropriate handling of prisoners.

  We began to make our drive back to downtown San Diego to the government's Metropolitan Correctional Center, commonly referred to as MCC. Mark was an extremely effective agent but had the stereotypical dry and seemingly humorless FBI personality, at least on the surface. Mark was respectful to the prisoner, although his attitude could have easily been mistaken for a dose of sarcasm and cockiness. Mark continually asked if the temperature was okay throughout the drive. He turned on the radio and kept flipping through stations, asking our prisoner if he liked each station. However, the prisoner, who was clearly upset at having served years in the state prison only to be picked up upon his release to be taken to a federal prison, was not in the mood to be picky about the radio station he was listening to.

  The prisoner was respectful towards us, which to my surprise I would find was the normal attitude directed towards FBI agents when we arrested criminals. As we drove along, I could sense his feeling of despair and of being trapped as I watched him gaze out of the rear passenger window at the streets and city landscape passing by. I knew that he knew that he had completely lost his freedom, and after years in one location was given a brief taste of driving through a city, only to be locked up for more years in another prison. I wondered what had led to his being in this situation. Over my career I would come to ponder that question many times, and I found that prisoners are not always the tough guys that I previously had imagined. Nor are they the innocent and frequently “framed” individuals that are represented in film and popular fiction. They are just people, and they are typically
people who are poor and have few resources. Instead of working a minimum wage job, they want to get rich quick by participating in criminal enterprises, such as bank robberies, drug dealing, and illegal alien smuggling. Sure, there are plenty of violent and horrible criminals. But the majority of criminals are uneducated and unwilling to have a legitimate job, so they get caught doing a crime that is financially motivated. That does not necessarily make them horrible people.

  This awareness was not the best attitude for me to have if I was going to continue to fight crime in the law-enforcement world. Law-enforcement officers need to be tough, they need to know that the people they are putting away are bad, and they must feel that they should not lose a wink of sleep at night because bad people got caught doing bad things. Life is simpler when everything can be neatly categorized into either black or white. But I tended to see grey; over time I was aware that I felt sympathy for some of the criminals and felt that there was zero chance that the prison system would rehabilitate them. If they went into the prison system being good people who made a bad decision, they might come out with only an education on how not to be caught the next time around. But I could not think of a better answer or magic solution to the criminal justice rehabilitation question, and besides, my job was to arrest criminals and put them in jail. My best bet would be to do so without thinking of the prisoners as people. Unfortunately, I never truly adjusted to that mode.