Inside the FBI: Cybercrime & Sextortion Explained

00:00:01 hey what’s up everybody you tuned in to another episode of strategic moves I’m your host Ken this is a place where we bring artart culture politics and business all together and we do it every Sunday right here on this channel but when I’m not shooting this podcast I am the owner of strategic resources and the founder of the africanamerican men’s Action Network we call it amen we specialize in political campaigns government and public relations work I’ve been doing it for over 25 years in this town met some interesting people

00:00:32 along the way and I want to make your next move a strategic move so this program gives me an opportunity to do just that we bring on people that we met we talk about our interesting lives and maybe it’s something that you can get out of it that’ll help you with your personal or business life you never know so if that sound like something you’ll be interested in all I need you to do is to hit that like button hit the notification Bell as well so that you will know the next time this program is coming on so without that we’re going to

00:01:01 keep moving forward and get things going but before I get started I want to give a shout out to the best podcast producer in the business DJ true what’s going on sir what’s up Ken how’s it going uh every day is a holiday every day is a holiday every today we gonna get to it man because we got we we’re doing a special and we we decided that you know um we wanted to take some time to go around and talk to some of the people around this city and our County about issues that’s going on Cleveland is

00:01:34 coming back up on the summer we got coming it’s always hot in the summer it’s always stuff that’s going on and we have known we had a police shortage in our city and all kinds of issues and we going to take this opportunity to run a series for you people we’re going to bring in some highlevel elected officials and non-elected officials that are in law enforcement and we’re going to talk about some of the things that they’re doing and what’s going on in the community and what they are going to be

00:02:03 doing in order to help either get an opportunity you can join their forces and be a part of what they’re doing or you better watch out because they coming after you so that’s what we’re gonna do today bust your doors in huh oh yeah they busting doors in this summer so we let y’all know that right now all right so what we’re going to do today is we’re gonna get started with as we call them in the neighborhood Top Authority is in the house today y’all Believe It or Not Top Authority Top Authority those three

00:02:28 letters that everybody run from FBI is in the house today we got the agent in charge of the Cleveland office here in Cleveland none other than Miss Greg Nelson and we call him his title is SSA Nelson correct sa sa Nelson is in the house today and he is over the Cleveland division of the FBI here so everybody let’s give him a warm welcome thank you thank you for coming in thank you for coming in man rather be here than anywhere else right now oh you know what that’s a great compliment man and we

00:03:02 appreciate you coming in you know I grew up here in Cleveland and had a lot of uh friends of mine and grew up in the neighborhood that has all kinds of experiences and we know that the neighborhoods are just not the same as they were and so I want to do my little part by being able to at least educate the community about some of the things that they may not know and give our law enforcement and other people an opportunity to be able to work in our community to kind of help us in any way that they can So today we’re going to

00:03:32 get an opportunity to sit down and talk with you a little bit and kind of break the ice with your organization and talk a little bit about what it is that the FBI office of Cleveland is doing as well as get some information about yourself but before we start our program we always get in everybody business a little bit and we know the FBI don’t get too much business so we’re gonna ask you give us some background man I know you didn’t come from you’re not from Cleveland you started out somewhere else

00:03:59 so give us a little quick overview your um descent to where you are today absolutely and first I’ll start by saying I’m the luckiest person to have this job I love the job I love the FBI I’ve been in the FBI for almost 23 years a couple weeks it be 23 years okay and I certainly started investigating as a just like every other special agent does investigating uh different Federal violations of the law I specifically worked a lot of drug gang and inv violent crime violations when I first came and I was assigned to Miami from

00:04:28 there you know you can make a couple decisions do you want to continue investigating or do you want to go the promotion route I I decided to to take the promotion route so I moved a few times I’ve been to DC I’ve been to Buffalo I’ve been to Pittsburgh wow uh and then sieges and in Clarksburg West Virginia and uh my final wrestling spot is here in Cleveland and I wouldn’t want to be in any other place except right here in Cleveland so you you moved quite a bit six times from uh the day I started I was a police officer in

00:04:57 Virginia Beach Virginia for about seven years um and then from Virginia to Miami and that started the track uh to the process and it’s been six moves so so what made you want to go into law enforcement in beginning so you were out of high school college and he said I want to be a a cop start funny story is uh when I was growing up in high school I used to watch the live police TV shows okay didn’t know a police officer didn’t know an FBI agent but it it attracted me okay and it got me initially interested and

00:05:25 as I got older into high school and college I did some more research um thought it was a right fit for me I I I I I like to be out and about um at least initially in my career with the community I do a lot of Outreach I investigate crimes like to think that I’ve at least made a few things safer throughout my career so it just grew on me I wasn’t an office person to begin with and here I am sitting in a suit right 23 years later right but yeah initially I just I just want to get out there and uh work with our partners and

00:05:53 uh have fun so you started out uh and you say Miami was where you first started yeah that was my first office of assignment yes it was pre 911 so I was down there when 911 happened okay did you um work your way through there or did you leave there and straight up from there I went to Washington DC I promoted to the supervisory special agent or SSA position so from there you decide to join the FBI no I joined from Virginia as a police officer okay I got hired out of northfi Virginia in my first office

00:06:22 they moved me all the way down to Miami and that was my first office so I started in 2001 first office of assignment was Miami Florida so is it easier becoming a agent because you’re a police officer versus not being a police officer going in no I think it’s equal playing Ground so the people were looking for attorneys and I’ll highlight anybody out there listening with some type of cyber degree or experience we want you um there’s military we’ve hired band directors from high schools we want a diverse background of different people

00:06:56 professional athletes have gone through school teachers veterinarians doctors okay um so we hire a multitude of of of diverse backgrounds um we look for true we look for leaders Future Leaders MH all right so as you was working your way through there and you decided your first stop you say was in DC Miami FL Miami Florida and you say there you was doing a lot of uh drug crime and stuff I imagine down there is a lot of drug violent crime um Absolut gang investigation so yeah we were I was working a lot with the local police

00:07:27 departments um because again FBI would fail if we try to work by ourselves Partnerships on the law enforcement and non-law enforcement especially our community members are probably one of the most important things that makes us successful so what made you leave Miami uh you you know I love the food I love the people I love the espresso right um but I was ready to get back into the supervisory role uh so DC was that route and and to be honest I wanted Four Seasons I missed the Four Seasons uh so

00:07:56 I love my snow I like my cool weather and my fall so we’re ready for that change and in order to promote to where I wanted to go you have to go to Washington DC so DC would gave you four seeds and not too much of it neither it’s just a little bit of snow yeah it just gave you a little bit so what you do in DC what was mainly your with I went I worked I switched over so I was a primarily criminal investigator in Miami and I wanted to it was just it was after 911 I went through 911 in Miami and I

00:08:22 wanted to move over to the counterterrorism side so uh I went up to DC uh as a counterterrorism supervisor and while I was there the the section I was in switched over to the weapons of mass D destruction directorate so I was lucky enough to work uh different uh Intel collection uh out of Iraq that was when the Iraq war was in 2006 so I worked with some other agencies um and I learned a lot I got to lead a small group of people and and I enjoyed it had some successes some leadership successes so I said hey why not go this road we

00:08:54 continueed on this road so how long you stayed in DC I was there for four plus years years um so while I was in DC I made a switch I didn’t have to move but I went from DC uh area to quano so I was able to teach at quanico okay for just over two years I um I had a daughter in high school and I promised not to move her while she was in high school okay um so I switched over and I taught at quanico so all the new agents coming in for a couple years I taught defensive tactics and physical training to them so

00:09:26 quanico is the main place where you go to train and everything I I I did watch that program too I watch quanico too so so so in that program in there that’s where everybody goes when you join the FBI you a everybody goes to quico so we have different we have we’ll break it down we have three different career paths special agent which which is the one I’m in all special agents have to go to quano and it’s anywhere from 18 to 22 weeks you live there there’s intelligence staff so intelligence analysts um and anyone in that

00:09:58 intelligence career field have to go to quanico for it depends on what path you’re down for anywhere from 8 to 12 weeks uh professional staff employees they usually go for distant onboarding for one week and they get the most of their training at the field office so okay I like to compare us to like a small business and this is what a lot of people don’t know uh is we have mechanics we staff we have HR Specialists we have admin Specialists we have secretaries so I message out to the public if they’re looking for a job

00:10:28 don’t rule us out we have a lot of opportunity as many law enforcement agencies do interesting you know so it’s almost similar to almost like the military yeah to some degree because you you got me thinking if you decide you want to go you go off it’s not like here where you going to you know a police officer go to it’s little train you actually going off to training and in most cases and like you’re saying you staying there some weeks to get all your training you live there and everything so to that point if you wanted to be a

00:10:59 mechanic or anything you can go there and you kind of pick your um position you’re right you get hired for a position okay so this the special agent program they’re going to teach you everything you need to know so if you’re a school teacher with no law enforcement experience they’re going to teach you if you’re a police officer like myself who got hired as a special agent you’re going to go through the same training that school teacher does for the special agent position okay if you’re an analyst

00:11:25 the same thing you’re going to go they’re going to teach you how to write and how to do analysis if you’re a mechanic or someone else on the professional sta side you generally have the certification before you come into the FBI and we hire you because of that certification so you don’t necessarily go to quanico for a length of time but we have other inservice credits and trainings that you can take to advance your your current training so if you were a mechanic yes do you have to do they have to be hiring Mechanics for you

00:11:54 to go that’s how it works okay I understand okay and we’ll provide Advanced Training like send you to different one or two week schools uh to make you better at what you do for us interesting interesting okay so you taught e quanico how long you do there a little over two years oh that was a short stint it it was so that was all considered my headquarters or DC time so I just switched from one job to the other um and I did a little over two years and I loved it um and I wouldn’t trade it for the world but I was ready

00:12:22 to get back into uh field operations you always ready to get back back to it again yeah I was I was ready to get back to it so what did you do there I went from quanico to Buffalo um New York yeah that’s where I grew up don’t make well you wanted some snow I guess you got your snow that’s I was like Buffalo New York so I I I went back home uh so to speak in Buffalo okay and and for the most of my time there I was a supervisor over our joint terrorism task force so uh International terrorism investigations domestic terrorism and

00:12:53 then weapons of mass destruction or kind of the bomb threat biological nuclear threats are the stuff that I was supervisor so as a supervisory special agent in Buffalo wow so did you have any real things that stuck up in your mind that you dealt with when you we this was back in 2010 so uh listen there’s a lot that goes behind the scenes that make our community safer that we that people don’t know and community members don’t know about um which is great stuff so I I can certainly say we’ve had a lot of

00:13:23 threats and and you know when you look back you you don’t know you know somebody may have the capability and may have you know weapons or guns you don’t know what their mindset is and if they were really going to do something but you I was satisfied with saying hey we took those guns off the street and with he arrested that person or not we got them some help that we think that could make them acclimate to society better so we we did arrest some people for some terrorism violations um all on open

00:13:50 source I don’t remember the names I’m older now and it gets uh it gets it get it’s tough to remember we did have some successful investigations and prosecutions on terrorism side which which is pretty impressive um you know regarding uh regarding the terrorist activity you actually had U disarm any bombs while you were there did not W lot it’s unfortunately we do have lots of bomb threats and that’s one of the things that we’re seeing for whatever reason um you know people making those bomb threats we treat them all the same

00:14:21 you know our partners you know the local on enforcement are generally the first people there and they do a phenomenal job clearing um with the bombom dogs we work side by side we have a special agent bomb technician um that works with the uh the local bomb experts so they they’re all collaborated working together um and they know uh you know what’s going on in the community if there’s a bomb thrat regardless of what it is they all get those notifications so Network those guys are kind of special aren’t they they’re smart people

00:14:48 yeah they really smart guys you think I mean on I know I know think right they gota have a little craziness to them to want to run in there and deal with that yeah now listen nowadays there’s a lot of equipment where you like a cntv yeah yeah I don’t know that we’ve ever suited up in that that big green out walk down there and dis and dis bomb there there’s so much equipment where you can drive something over there and those are your hand so if something does go boom it’s nobody’s in danger it’s a piece of

00:15:18 equipment right picks that equipment up puts it in a safe big safe container and they take it out to some safe place where they will do the disarming and they’ll do the actual work to see if it is a is a bomb so you know we talked about that earlier the TV shows right a lot of that some of that is is pretty cool and it’s accurate but I don’t know not that we couldn’t but for the most part we have a lot of equipment that keeps us in the community safe that we would use to disarm or at least look at

00:15:44 if a bomb’s legit or not and you guys check out every threat like you were saying if somebody call in it’s a threat on that and these kids who’s doing these threats with these Bond threats with schools and that kind of stuff uh you guys are that’s who they call you guys to check out all of those threats not all the time um it it’s a lot of times those are reported to a local police agency but a lot of times uh some little you know it’s you and I talking and maybe you see something that you you see

00:16:13 some type of bomb threat on scene or the school reports it to get reported us they’ll generally call 1800 call FBI 247 um service there or tips that fbi.gov but most of the time it comes in through a 911 Center if it comes through our our uh tips at fbi.gov M it’s 24/7 they will call the field office we’ll wake somebody up if it’s 2: in the morning and we get working on it but we don’t do it alone we always call the local agency the police agency that is jurisdiction and we’ll work it together is that a a a federal offense like a kid

00:16:46 who does that so if they does it and and it y’all trace it back that’s it it could be now most of these in Fair disclosure are prosecuted at a local level okay just because it it’s a juvenile um and the local level or the local jurisdictions are better at getting that kid or family the services they need and you know speaking of bomb threats that we’ve seen online you know it’s sad 13 to 17 year old generally males but females are not excluded or what we’re seeing and and it’s anywhere from it was

00:17:19 a joke I was mad at somebody and online gaming platform and and this is the way I reacted or just didn’t want to go to school that day um but yeah those those are the common things that we hear when we knock on the door and and talk to Mom and Dad and and most often mom and dad are tremendously responsive and that goes into you know the impact or what you do at the end anyways how engaged the parents are as a result of this so um yeah that’s that’s what we’re seeing on that front so so since we on stay on

00:17:47 that topic for a little bit um this new thing swatting yeah you know a friend of mine um congresswoman Shantel Brown she’s a friend of mine yes and she just um got SWAT it recently I guess and that so that that imagine is going up another level because now you brought in a much of enforcements and everything along that lines right yeah so that what swatting is is is somebody creating emergency such as something’s happening bad right now they call 911 and they they force a a quick police response um

00:18:24 to those residences generally you know we’re not going to respond to a swatting incident we’re not First Responders but we do work with local law enforcement and we try to connect the dots across the United States because it could be somebody sitting on the west coast that’s making these type of swatting efforts different states different schools different political figures for whatever reason and we also have a lot of connections overseas where somebody’s sitting overseas and they’re making those same threats what’s good about the

00:18:53 FBI is we have a Long Reach we have people that sit and represent more than 283 different countries okay so we have those relationships with liaison services in those nation in those International locations where we can pass information and a lot of times they will action that on our behalf so um ultimate goal is to identify the person behind the keyboard um and then either get that person help they need or if it’s a Judicial action then we will coordinate with our prosecutors at the local and federal uh levels and

00:19:24 determine which direction is best you know um since we on that a little bit let’s dip our toes and this cyber stuff and all of that a little bit I had a I did an interview with um Tim and Tamia Woods I met them last week ah you met them last week they they are the recipient of our director’s leadership award so we’ll be to Washington DC I believe it’s on April 19th to receive that award from the director for the phenomenal work they’ve done excellent under those horrible circumstances horrible circumstances man I had them on

00:19:57 the show I I I I watched TV and watch the news a lot to figure out what I want to do and I saw that one and that one kind of got to me just the whole circumstance then when I had them in on the show and had a chance to talk with him and got in depth to what really happened man it’s just terrible so for the people know they were on our show they were victims of um sex tortion their son was a victim of sex tortion and he he had um took his life as a result of people calling them threatening and saying they were going

00:20:26 to show pictures of him and things of that nature your office how’s your office working in regards to that and and helping people with that we and it’s unfortunate um but we have seen a significant uptick in sextortion violations across the United States that result in suicide um so we are doing everything we can to work with people like Tim and timia other local law enforcement agencies to just encourage kids report it to someone you trust report it to law enforcement so we can work it from our angle we work with the

00:20:59 local prosecutors we work with our local Partners we identify that person on the other end of the keyboard and we try to do whatever we can to hold them judicially responsive we try to make an arrest on those extortion cases but you know if I could really just encourage anybody listening adults you have to have conversations with your kids you have to talk about uh what the outcomes can be if you share a naked photo or an explicit photo online um you have to know what’s on your kid’s phone I know

00:21:31 it’s hard I had a teenage daughter back in that man if I would touched that her phone within 3 feet I was getting snapped at so you got to find a way to have those conversations and if you go to our fbi.gov website upper right hand corner just Google sextortion there are some phenomenal talking points um so adults can talk to the kids trusted adults can talk to their kids but the biggest thing is understand they’re not a victim they did nothing wrong that’s correct they need to report it that’s

00:22:00 correct that that’s the biggest piece right there that they know that and knowing that there’s agencies like yourself and others that’s not going to look at them any differently and will help them through that process yeah absolutely and and to your listeners we do a lot of Outreach one of our main Outreach points is about sextortion we go to schools U we go to different Community groups we talk to adults we talk to kids um in fact I have an online safety uh document I want to leave with you you can share that with with your

00:22:29 listeners or however you want to do that but it’s just some basic points um but we need to keep messaging it together yeah that’s going to be the key to that and then the last thing on that uh because you’re going to have another one of your agents going to come in we’re going to really dive deep in that right now the other big thing is these seniors and they ain’t even seniors hell they done got me a couple of times I I done been hacked and and people done took money and people called all the time man

00:22:56 with all kinds of gimmicks and really got to be sharp you know because they they will they will get you if you’re not careful um what’s you’ve been seeing any uptakes in that kind of thing happen absolutely and I want to say this to if it is too good to be true it is don’t click on it uh don’t open it up delete it and go to the real website if it’s saying that you have to you have an issue um but yeah it generally our our aging population over 60 we’ve seen a really big uptick because they’re financially secure they have retirement

00:23:29 sometimes they’re looking for companionship and that companionship could mean a partner it could be just a common group interest um just a nice person who called on the phone just a nice person to talk to yeah so if somebody within the first week of meeting them is saying how much they care and love you and oh by the way I need $1,000 to get a new computer or I need you to transfer this money or give me a credit card number never ever share your personal identifying information or anything that has to do with your

00:23:56 finances um especially to someone you’ve never met and then that’s just that that’s the teaser for when uh Charlie Johnston rat comes down and talks about it further excellent I got a quick question sure what about um there’s a lot of social media like identity theft or people taking over people’s Pages now how far does the FBI get into that type of stuff yeah anything online we will take a look at and make a determination then and that’s where the Partnerships comes into play we do have certain

00:24:28 thresholds for prosecution um but the Federal Trade Commission also works identity theft and in fact there’s a a media um next week where we’re going to do a round Rob and for two hours at the media Federal Trade Commission I’ll be there the US attorney will be there to talk about different online crimes um but the Federal Trade Commission is awesome at takeovers for different websites such as Facebook if you just report it at their website um that’s how to get things rolling and then also for us anything online related ic3.gov

00:25:01 report it we have people that are monitoring those reports and uh they will they put the puzzles together right so if it’s just a a, fraud here that may be linked to a $100,000 fraud somewhere else correct they put those pieces of the puzzle together the Federal Trade Commission does a phenomenal job um at working that identity theft and and takeovers of different identities online um and they work together to try to identify the people and most important certainly we work together to try to get

00:25:30 the money back or at least some of the money back of those who lost uh anything so can you give everybody again if you a senior or someone at home and you what’s that whereever address they can go to ic3.gov I3 it’s the letter I the letter c the number three. goov ic3.gov excellent and then around Robin that you just had mentioned yeah I think it’s next Tuesday there’s a media event where there’s going to be five or six contributors or people there myself us attorney’s office I don’t know when it’s going to be the Federal Trade

00:26:05 Commission I think the Federal Trade Commission actually set it up okay and it revolves around different online uh frauds that we’re seeing most of to and one of them is identity theft or if you get your your identity or your identity stolen so I don’t know when those are going to be aired it’s probably a little different for each one of the uh channels okay um but something to look forward to um had your show I I would definitely um keep up with Susan and make sure I reach out to her and um because we can add that as a link to

00:26:33 this program and and people who want to go um check into that and I think that’s important um to get that information out to people absolutely so let’s talk about now we got you out of quico I want to get you to Cleveland because you got a long history of getting there and so from quano you went to where and then where I went to Buffalo uh from Buffalo I went to Pittsburgh and I I promoted to the assistant special agent chur charge of the Pittsburgh field office okay um I worked mainly criminal stuff about

00:27:03 Midway through there I was there about four years I switched over uh and I worked the Cyber and the intelligence piece because I wanted to diversify my own background and learn more about those cyber violations okay from there I went down to Clarksburg West Virginia which was te another headquarters assignment at sieges criminal justice Information Services Division wow which is completely different that is law enforcement support so think about ncic system that our police officers use to run wants and warrants checks okay it

00:27:33 has NX uh NX does all I can’t say all but the majority of background checks anybody who buys a firearm a handgun at least um those checks run through sieges or Nicks right the national threat operations section which was one of the sections that I oversaw when I was down there they’re the 247 conduit for answering the phones they answer the 1800 call FBI and they monitor the tips. FBI goov 247 so you will get a live person if you want to report a federal violation at 1800 call FBI um 247 247 now there might be a little wait

00:28:09 depending on the call volume um but it’s not an hour a long way but uh but yes that is a way that you can report Federal violations huh and that office did all of that they did they also do all the data collection for all you know the uh for all the crime statistics and the the official FBI Publications pertaining those climate statistics they collect that data through seis um and they verify it and they publish it every year so you done worked in every aspect yeah that was different for me um it was

00:28:41 I was it was really really cool I got to learn I you I manage multi-million dollar budgets which is scary um hiring processes uh the behind the scenes law enforcement support I had nothing I did not work or support or I did not work cases or manage cases when I was down there was solely supporting the FBI and supporting law enforcement the 16,500 plus law enforcement agencies across the United States so you just giving them a lot more support and helping them with their that’s pretty cool yeah so that is

00:29:12 a lot what aspects haven’t you worked in you think um you know I I look at myself you know the Jack of all trades expert of nothing so that’s good I like I like a little bit of change I like doing and trying things different that was my path I don’t want to say I get bored with anything I just want to say that I like to try to learn uh and grow and and try to experience different uh different things and and I’ve been lucky enough to touch most of our programs probably not all of them um but at least I’ve I’ve

00:29:40 gotten a little bit of experience there and your family moved every time you moved yeah my daughter’s still mad at me so how many kids you got I got one oh well that was lucky you only had one I argue with yeah but you know she was some great kid um but yeah it’s tough I family when you move around you know the friend Network wife always been supportive um has to find a new job almost everywhere we move um so it’s tough on them but I can say I got 100% support all the way around it’s it’s key when

00:30:08 you get into a profession such as law enforcement or or something that requires you either move or the the community aspect of it it’s really important to have those conversations before you get hired so the whole family understands what the criteria are for uhh for the job that you put in for so how did you get the job with Cleveland well luck uh good timing but no so you know there’s a and there’s a certain you have to check the boxes so to speak you have to have different leadership experiences before you can put for uh

00:30:40 the special agent in charge position that I hold today um so we have a we have kind of a system that records all the openings or the vacancies and if you qualify for that vacancy you can put in and compete uh for the job and that’s exactly what I did I think there was about 11 people total that put in for this job yeah yeah there’s not now keep in mind is the higher you move up in the organization there fewer people are um that qualify for that position so 11’s actually a pretty decent number um when

00:31:10 you’re looking at the different special agent charge positions okay and uh it goes through a board at headquarters of Executives and then uh the director will call the one who’s selected so I got that director’s call on a Tuesday wow actually missed his first call then I was lucky enough that he called back to congratulate me so excellent oh it’s pretty cool yeah so how long you been here uh since August 1st 2022 so 19 months coming up by 19 months H so how you like the Cleveland office and before

00:31:39 we get into that you can answer this all in one question how you like the office and tell us what does the Cleveland office does and what is your responsibility so my responsibility is don’t let anything Break um and hire good leaders to make sure things are getting done to the uh you know to the communities expectations so we serve so how we’re broken down we serve Cleveland we sit in Cleveland as an office but we have 40 counties so think about Mansfield just south of Mansfield right and left to P to Pennsylvania in the

00:32:11 border of Indiana and then 40 counties North that’s our area of responsibility so our Cleveland office sits in downtown Cleveland and then we have eight smaller offices they’re called resident agencies that cover the area further away from Cleveland um but they’re all under you know under under my uh supervision okay uh and what we do so we work any federal violation primarily you know about the gangs and drugs of violent crime we work everything with our partners we also work the terrorism stuff that we touched

00:32:41 on we work white collar crime we touched on the the frauds the online frauds money laundering um we work uh public corruption civil rights violations uh we work uh different cyber so we have a cyber criminal team and a cyber National Security team MH um so think uh you know seek the secret spy stuff right so Counter Intelligence people want to know our secrets um so for Cleveland in the area here we defend against that we work uh cases to to prevent that um so any type of violation you see I’m going to

00:33:13 leave your handout of how we’re laid out as well so feel free to to post that or share that um but any type of federal violation falls into our jurisdiction um and we have great Partnerships atatf US Marshals um HSI home and security um border patrol and if I left anybody out I apologize but we work well with our local state and federal Partners daily that’s a huge area you know when you think about Cleveland we always think about just downtown Cleveland and you would think you know because hell

00:33:43 there’s a lot of crime going on in Cleveland it’s like okay your hands are full but you got a huge area that you want to get into so let’s get to some nitty-gritty questions you know let’s get down to it all right so let’s talk about the relation ship between the africanamerican community and FBI it’s not always been a good one over the years and everything what do you think from your experience of going through all the things and you coming here to Cleveland how’s your office working or the FBI as a general is working to try

00:34:15 to help with the equity diversity inclusion and that kind of thing I’m glad you asked that I wanted to touch on that so overall our bigger um national press office did a study there’s you and there’s a study out there for anything you can find almost any answer you want the study that came back that they did and then I don’t know the interest we can find we can get you the facts behind that so that overall there is some pretty good confidence in what we’re doing what I will say is I agree with you 100% it is on me as the leader of

00:34:45 the Cleveland FBI office to gain the trust of our African-American communities and all of our communities any type of community and that’s where we met right that was my effort is I was trying to get out to and hit the different Community leaders allow you to see me with a chief of police from the Cleveland division of police with the US attorney and with members of our staff again it’s out me to an it’s on me to answer your questions be honest um and and build those strong relationships where they could be stronger um and I

00:35:16 thank you for following up and inviting me here because this is part of that uh that track uh to get the confidence of all of our community members are are they making any changes in the way to do any recruitment to the African-American Community we are so listen I want to hire and that’s why I’m here I want to hire a good diverse background we we I don’t know what our diversity uh recruitment stats are what’s unique about the FBI is I may hire you out of my Cleveland office but you may end up in Los Angeles it’s where the vacancy

00:35:48 exists so part of of what we’re doing with the Outreach to gain Trust of our community members is recruitment um I want to hear about what your background is I want want to talk about the vacancies we have here um we have a 30×30 Initiative for for female uh females in the law enforcement fields which covers everybody which simply means by 2030 we want 30% of our hires on the on the special agent side at least to be female and that covers all backgrounds okay um right now we could use Improvement on the diversity hiring

00:36:21 we can use Improvement on the female hiring and I’m working hard you know doing podcasts like this getting after the communities I want them to here for me um and I’ll say this to our community members don’t rule us out FBI jobs there’s a thousand jobs out there look at what the requirements are you may meet something that you are interested in we’re not all special agents in fact only about less than a third of our employees are special agents meaning the people who carry the guns in the batteries so for reference 37,000 about

00:36:53 FBI employees across the entire FBI about 13,000 are special agents that leaves 26,000 plus different job prescriptions that fit that all other category so um that’s a common myth that people think that there’s not an opportunity for them we have opportunities for people who don’t have college degrees entry level positions that that was my next question what was the most misunderstood so you you you can go ahead go ahead and on that you know people you know learn about the FBI through TV or a friend who thinks they

00:37:27 know we do I would encourage call us if you have an interest in a job invite us to your community event um I love recruitment I love talking about what we do but don’t rule us out as a as a as an employer um I will you know there are there are disqualifiers we do have disqualifiers and I want to highlight this the biggest thing that we’re seeing right now Len you have you have to pay your bills you have to pay your taxes really so you have you have to you have to pay that stuff but with the legalization of marijuana okay

00:37:58 leg marijuana and CBD are are legal to use or they will be legal to use uh in around September whenever that date is it’s still illegal at the federal level so if you are interested in a job with the FBI or any agency or law enforcement agency make sure you know what the drug policy is because it could it could exclude you from being hired or it could just postpone your application significantly um also for prescription drugs if your name’s not on it don’t use it um those are two of the biggest things

00:38:31 um that are eliminating people from a job with the FBI and it’s kind of sad because and I’ve seen some really really cool and good and diverse people that would make awesome employees but they eliminated they were eliminated because of one of those things and then last when you’re meeting with the recruiter it’s a full confessional don’t try to beat the polygraph um really that yeah that that that recruiter will say hey you need to wait six months or a year year or two years or maybe even three

00:38:59 years because of this but you’re honest with me so you can apply then if you don’t disclose that at any point and you fail the polygraph you’re done so you got to take a polygraph every FBI employee takes a polygraph really in fact I brought the pluger here we’re going to put you on oh no really how do you know that yeah every now every law enforcement agency is different some do have the polygraph some don’t the FBI every employee and it’s really two pieces of that polygraph one is are you are are you qualified you

00:39:30 line by your application your drugs your history did you break the law and get away with it all that stuff the other piece is the National Security piece so if you if you yeah are you a spy are you you know that type of thing so there’s two pieces of that but yeah every every FBI employee regardless of what position you’re putting in for does have to pass a polygraph that what what’s the age limit for a special agent like is cut off great question and thank you for asking so special agent has to be h HED

00:39:58 23 I believe is the earliest age and the uh your 37 the day of your 37th birthday you have to be hired by now there are some exceptions if you have previous federal law enforcement experience or military they can give you an extension um and the reason behind that is because we have to retire uh when we’re 57 that’s that’s just a a regulation so you have to have 20 years in before you can retire so you have to retire at 57 as a in the special agent position all the other positions those 26,000 other positions I talked about you can

00:40:32 get hired at 40 50 and 60 and work till you’re done um but the special agent position is 23 to 37 and again there are some exceptions there reasons for some exceptions but generally 57 that the the month of your 57th birthday you have to retire oh they take you out the field they take you out they do that’s good and bad right I guess it’s getting bad if you really wanted to be in there you’re like man you’re taking me out it’s like you’re retiring me listen 57 is early to retire no you know what it’s

00:40:58 not I’m 56 yeah so hell if I was saying that’s not that’s why when you say I like really yeah that’s not bad it’s not it’s not bad it’s not that’s why you have to be hired by your 37th birthday so you get 20 years of service in with those few exceptions H let me see if there’s anything else I got out of here that I is there anything um Susan that you wanted me to make sure we touch based on because we recording so you can speak up and we can put it in there I think if you could talk a little bit more about the technical roles

00:41:32 absolutely yeah so let me ask the question then what’s the question professional support and all right can you give us a little background uh about the difference in the professional roles and the technical roles yeah so again we have different tiers we talked about the special agent enough so we’ll leave that back but we have professional staff we talked about the admin specialist the secretary is technical again I’ll say it again if you have it or if you have cyber experience come see me we have uh Financial

00:42:02 analysts so they they’re basically accountants on steroids that do all the financial analysis um on our cases and and and track the money or follow the money uh we have uh IT specialist you talk about computer scientists we have uh counterterrorism specialist Counter Intelligence specialist um so all different types of specialty they worded as specialty positions that require kind of those degrees that we talked about earlier that we don’t provide you um but you come to us with an advanced degree um

00:42:33 and you want to come work with the FBI we’ll hire you and then we’ll we’ll pay for your continuing education along those degrees but anything in the it field the Cyber field the forensics field um we wanna we want to talk to you let me ask you do you have any particular goals that you would like to achieve in the Cleveland office while you here and and to um I don’t know where your career would take you from here but while you here what what particular goals would you like to try to achieve I tell you it’s Community

00:43:02 Trust I want to I don’t think we’re in a horrible place but I want to get out similar to again how we met hit our community leaders hit our communities um and I want to leave confident that I at least improved that or made that change um we have great people who are great cases and we have great Partnerships with the law enforcement and and business side love to see those continue um I still want to see us make these communities safer but part of that safety is not just to rest in your way through that it’s Community Trust making

00:43:34 them feel confident enough to talk to us about different crimes or what’s going on in their neighborhoods and then educating them so they can educate their high school kids their Elementary children um on what to do and what not to do so that that would be a success for me yeah you know and that I think is the secret sauce yeah I think you you you you you you’re on to the secret sauce because you you know when you say that I go to a lot of meetings and you say oh we all want to collaborate we want to work together we want to work

00:44:03 together that’s the people in that room working together right and and to that point like you say there’s so many layers of law enforcement and things that take place that it’s not necessarily that we all can work together in some cases because you know oh that’s your jurisdiction or you you can deal with that but to have the ability to have the trust of the people yeah to say you know what I’m going to call or I’m going to talk is where it it really is because then you can bypass some of that and it makes it easier for

00:44:35 you to decide where it should go maybe you will direct them back to something local but they at least came to you first you’re right and it’s funny so know I’ve been here 19 months we have this big office that’s about three miles from where we’re sitting here now don’t wor don’t worry about that and when I talked to people they have no they walk by our office every day they don’t even know that we’re there right um and so it’s a reminder to me to get out there talk about what we do we have a Twitter

00:45:01 account uh follow us hear the real stories we have a Facebook account so we have social media we have an Instagram account so look us up follow us hear the good stuff here what we’re doing ask us questions have us out to your businesses and and let’s let’s talk about what we do and we can do together tell me um before you let you want you give us a couple of the good things you like to talk about that you guys are doing right now cyber security for our kids for for our parents and our Educators um

00:45:27 anything you want to talk we do active shooter training for businesses we go out we talk about um what to do I hope it never happens and but what happens what our version of run hiide fight is if you find yourself in a bad situation where there’s an active shoot or how to react um versus freezy those are the two most common wow um we go out and we we hit you know Cleveland State the different universities um we do recruitment events we’re always trying to get out there we’ll hit some intelligence classes you know some of

00:45:57 those intelligence program talking about job opportunities here so we’re out there and we want to become part of a bigger part of the community that’s great man and you know what I I want to do my part to do whatever I can to help that’s why I asked you to come on and I’m um very excited about you allowing yourself to open us up to other members of your um state of of your business there or from that what’s the what’s the proper term your um your office your office to come in and work with us and

00:46:26 and help us to educate the people that cyber crime and some of these cyber crime we haven’t even talked about and what’s really big in our community is the um human trafficking I mean it seems like you know these children and and adults are just coming up missing all you know so having to be able to talk about those things are very special to us and we’ll definitely make sure we do our part to get it out in the community thank so but like we do with all of our shows you get an opportunity now to talk

00:46:54 right into this camera I’m gonna give you that opportunity make sure you leave information on how they can get in touch with your office let people know anything you want to talk about recruitment anything about that please do take your time the camera is yours and any of those things that you want to refer to I’ll make sure we leave that in our uh thing as well so people can take a look at so take your time yes it’s on you thank you Ken Ken I appreciate you having me um and what I want to do for

00:47:21 the community members is involve Us in what you do invite us to some of your events we want to talk about recruitment we want to talk about safety and never never rule us out as a potential job opportunity we hire all sorts of backgrounds uh and maybe just maybe that you will fit into one of those fields uh and thank you again for having us uh how they can reach you because we we I’m GNA edit this in give them information on how they can contact if they have cyber crime problems again and if they want to

00:47:52 recruit join there how they can so some great websites to visit for any type of cyber fraud anything that happens online ic3.gov so that’s capital I Capital C the the number three. goov General Federal VI General Federal violations 1 1800 call FBI or tips.fbi.gov for jobs it’s just FBI jobs.gov uh and you can there’ll be a whole slew of job just make sure that you look at the area that job is posted not everything is Cleveland specific so if you could mention that one reporting online or by phone your

00:48:33 identity can remain confidential and as always whenever you report to the FBI we want to hear from you but your identity can remain anonymous okay so hey all those links that he just talked about is going to be listed in his description of this program where you can reach out and make sure you can get it he left some information here also we’ll make sure that that information is made available for you as well and once again look out for our series we’re going to do a series on safety law enforcement in

00:49:02 kyoga county and we just kicked it off today with special agent in charge of the Cleveland office Greg Nelson and we’ll see you next week peace great job thank you Kev J great job great job