Assistant Director, Criminal Justice Information Services Division

Michael A. Christman was named assistant director of the Criminal Justice Information Services Division in West Virginia in March 2021. The CJIS Division provides state-of-the-art tools and services to law enforcement, national security and intelligence community partners, and the public. Mr. Christman had most recently served as the special agent in charge of the Pittsburgh Field Office.

Mr. Christman joined the FBI as a special agent in February 1992. He served on the Safe Streets Task Force in Salt Lake City, targeting violent gangs and Mexican drug-trafficking organizations. He also investigated violent crime and other criminal matters. Mr. Christman transferred to the Cleveland Field Office in 1997 and worked drug and terrorism cases.

In 2005, he was promoted to supervisory special agent and assigned to the Criminal Investigative Division at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. He transferred to the Pittsburgh Field Office in 2007, where he supervised violent crime, violent gang, drug, and organized crime programs. He also led the Greater Pittsburgh Safe Streets Task Force.

Mr. Christman was promoted to assistant special agent in charge of Criminal, Intelligence, and Administrative Programs in Pittsburgh in 2014. He was put in charge of Pittsburgh’s Cyber and Intelligence Programs in 2015. Two years later, he was promoted to chief of a Cyber Operations section at Headquarters that managed all of the FBI’s cyber-criminal investigations. He also chaired the International Cyber Crimes Working Group.

In 2018, Mr. Christman was named the deputy assistant director of the CJIS Division’s Operational Programs Branch. He was named special agent in charge of the Pittsburgh Field Office in 2020.

Prior to his appointment with the FBI, Mr. Christman worked for the city prosecutor’s office in Akron, Ohio. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Youngstown State University and a law degree from the University of Akron.

About the CJIS Division 

The FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, or CJIS, is a high-tech hub in the hills of West Virginia that provides a range of state of-the-art tools and services to law enforcement, national security and intelligence community partners, and the general public.

History

In the summer of 1924, the FBI created an Identification Division (informally called “Ident” in the organization for many years to come) to gather prints from police agencies nationwide and to search them upon request for matches to criminals and crime evidence. The CJIS Division was established in February 1992 out of the former Identification Division to serve as the focal point and central repository for criminal justice information services in the FBI. It is the largest division in the FBI. Programs initially consolidated under the CJIS Division included the National Crime Information Center (NCIC), Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR), and Fingerprint Identification. In addition, responsibility for several ongoing technological initiatives was transferred to the CJIS Division, including the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS), NCIC 2000, and the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS).

The Complex

In January 1991, the FBI purchased 986 acres of land in Clarksburg, West Virginia on which to construct the home of the CJIS Division. Construction started in October 1991 and was completed in July 1995, on time and under budget. The heart of the complex is the 500,000-square foot main office building. Constructed in a modular design, this building is nearly the length of three football fields. It features a 600-seat cafeteria, a 500-seat auditorium, atria for visitors and employees, and a 100,000-square-foot computer center.