Mr. Schiff: Hello I’m Neal Schiff and welcome to Inside the FBI, a weekly podcast about news, cases, and operations. The FBI for many years operated domestically, meaning investigating crimes and making arrests inside the United States. As crimes and terrorism have become worldwide problems, the FBI more and more fosters relationships with governments in other countries. And now, there are 61 FBI legal attaché, or legat, offices and 14 sub-offices around the world. Assistant Director (AD) Sean Joyce heads the FBI’s International Operations Division. We talked with AD Joyce about how the FBI can help international police agencies and how they can help the FBI.
Mr. Joyce: “After the legal attaché office is established, we have initiated and established these relationships with our counterparts. Typically, they will come to us with questions that they have or investigations they are conducting that have a nexus to the United States. We, again, will work with those partners to attempt to facilitate their investigation. Conversely, if we here in the United States have an investigation that has an international nexus, we will then go to those same partners and ask for their assistance to assist us in the investigation.
Many individuals do not know—we do not have the same authorities overseas that we do domestically. We do not have arrest powers. We do not have investigative powers without the host nation’s authority. So again, we really fulfill and operate under a very different capacity. However, it has been very successful and continues to be so.”
Mr. Schiff: Could you give me an anecdote or two based on your experience of being a legal attaché?
Mr. Joyce: “Well, one anecdote that I was personally involved with is, we had a subject of an investigation that was out of New York. The individual was indicted out of the Southern District of New York, and I was notified, with approximately two hours, that this individual was going to be transiting where I was stationed, from another country, eventually to, what we believe, was to conduct some operational matters that would have affected probably U.S. military personnel in another country. I was able to talk with my liaison partners; we were able to get them to the airport to prepare for this individual transiting, and he was eventually arrested by the host nation and then later extradited to the United States. I recently testified in that trial and he just received a life sentence that was handed down. So, that is one story that I personally have.
All of our legats have done some phenomenal work, whether it’s in counterterrorism investigations, or whether in, like in Eastern Europe, where we have some extensive cyber investigations where we have conducted joint operations with the Romanians that have resulted in many arrests. We have done, really I think, the legat program has evolved over the last 10 years to much more than what we would typically call a ‘liaison relationship.’ We’ve really taken some of these trusted partnerships and developed them to become much more than that, where we are intricately and intimately involved in joint investigations in very sensitive matters and also very involved in some criminal matters, whether that’s in the financial crimes, organized crime, or cyber crime area. I know the Director, as well as other individuals, constantly echo how important and necessary the legat program is to, really, the success of the FBI.”
Mr. Schiff: What agencies are we working with internationally to keep the planet safer?
Mr. Joyce: “As many folks don’t know, everyone overseas that is stationed within the embassy operates under the Chief of Mission Authority, which is typically the ambassador. Depending upon the size of the embassy, will really dictate how many agencies are going to be present at that embassy. Typically the heads of the agencies represent what we call a ‘country team,’ and each one of those country team members—whether that’s going to be the CIA, whether that’s going to be the Drug Enforcement Administration, Department of Homeland Security, obviously all of the foreign service offices from the Department of State—really it is an opportunity to leverage all the resources, all the unique abilities that each of those agencies bring to that embassy, to really achieve the overall U.S.G. (government) mission there.”
Mr. Schiff: What’s the future of the FBI’s International Operations Division?
Mr. Joyce: “Hopefully the future will be, obviously depending upon funding and other matters that are really out of our hands, but hopefully Congress will assist us on this, is really expanding into those areas where we need to fulfill our mission to keep this nation safe and to also protect it from the emerging criminal threats throughout the world. So we need to focus on some of those countries that we do not have a full-time presence that are covered by a regional legat office that really, I think, necessitates a full-time presence there to effectively address not only the concerns of that host nation, but the concerns of that host nation as it relates to the United States and the U.S. interests in that area.”
Mr. Schiff: What is ‘tip of the spear’ activity?
Mr. Joyce: “Again, when people typically refer to ‘tip of the spear,’ what they mean is that the individuals that are stationed abroad, that are going to be aware of emerging trends and threats throughout the world. And again, our presence, I think, has identified many of these emerging threats in the areas I’ve already previously discussed, and really alert not only our organization, but other members of the intelligence and law enforcement community, of these threats that really could possible immigrate to the United States and really affect our national security and our criminal threats that exist today.”
Mr. Schiff: FBI Supervisory Special Agent Kathy Stearman has been a legal attaché for a few years. She’s worked in New Delhi, India, as well as Beijing, China, where she is located now. We asked her about not going out and arresting the bad guys on the streets of the U.S., but now acting as a liaison with other countries and international police agencies.”
Ms. Stearman: “That is correct, however, we do have the opportunity as legats to facilitate investigations for our FBI field offices domestically, and we definitely need our partners in order to do that. And one of the things that I’m most proud of, especially when I was working out of New Delhi, is I was fortunate enough to work with a great group of agents out of our (FBI) Newark Division. And they were working on an investigation that involved the Sri Lankan Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam, commonly known as the LTTE. The LTTE had several cells in the United States that were raising funds for terrorist activities in Sri Lanka. So I was fortunate enough to be able to bring Newark agents out to Sri Lanka, worked very closely with the Sri Lankan government to obtain evidence against these subjects, who were subsequently prosecuted. And I’m very proud of that because I know that the FBI efforts have really helped move the peace process forward in Sri Lanka, because now the LTTE has been pushed back by the Sri Lankan government, and that civil unrest is basically over and I know that the FBI efforts really made a difference there, so I’m very, very proud of that.”
Mr. Schiff: How is it when you are contacted by, say, your host country, and they’re wanting assistance on an investigation that crosses the ocean and comes all the way into the United States? What’s your role?
Ms. Stearman: “My role is to take that information and that request from the host government, our law enforcement counterparts, and I take a look at the request. I look at which FBI office, specifically, would be required to work on it. If I feel a request needs a little bit more information in order for me to pass it on to the FBI, I get that from my host country counterparts. And then that information goes out via the FBI system to that particular field office. And a lot of times it covers more than one field office or would involve Headquarters, and so it’s my job to look at the information and determine who best could obtain that information for our host country counterparts. And then, if there is any back and forth information or exchange that needs to be done, then I am the liaison person between our FBI field divisions and the host country in order to make that happen.”
Mr. Schiff: Same way coming back? A field office needs your help in New Delhi?
Ms. Stearman: “Absolutely. Absolutely. When there is an FBI investigation in the United States, domestically, that has a nexus to the host country in which I’m serving, then it’s my job to take that information, and again, make sure that I have enough information in order to give it to the host country, so they can facilitate obtaining that information from their law enforcement counterparts throughout the area of responsibility.”
Mr. Schiff: Operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the FBI’s International Operations Division in Washington and the legal attachés are doing their best to work with law enforcement partners worldwide overseeing terrorist, cyber or criminal activities for the safety of all. More about the FBI’s international operations on the Internet at
www.fbi.gov. That’s our show for this week. Thanks for listening. I’m Neal Schiff of the FBI’s Office of Public Affairs.
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