FBI Careers: Graduate Intern

Graduate Intern John, who works in the Forensic Accountant Unit, speaks about his FBI career. Learn more and apply at fbijobs.gov.

Video Transcript

John: My name is John, and I'm a graduate intern with the Forensic Accountant Unit at FBI Headquarters.

This usually involves performing financial analysis on different records that we've obtained through search warrants or subpoenas, so a lot of my work is going through people's banks statements, credit card statements, all that information and trying to piece together proof that they committed a crime.

One of the first cases I worked on was a public corruption investigation. We were looking into allegations that the public official was accepting bribes in exchange for criminal favors. I had a realization that the work that I was doing was corroborating these allegations. And if I was successful, this person would be prosecuted and go to prison.

You could become a special agent if you have your CPA and certain number of years of work experience; you could also become a forensic accountant. They're both great positions that offer you the chance to use your accounting skills in a variety of investigations.

The nice thing is that nearly every crime has a financial element to it. Whether it's counterterrorism, counterintelligence, public corruption, financial statement fraud—everything ties back to the money.

So my favorite thing about working for the FBI is that you have a lot of selfless employees who are dedicated to the same mission and all share very high ethical values. You can be a part of something much bigger than yourself by being an accountant here.