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Narrator: This year, the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force model turns 45.

Initially developed by the Bureau’s New York Field Office to help investigate local terrorism threats in the 1980s, FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces—or JTTFs, for short—soon spread to other field offices that handled similar investigations. And in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the model was adopted by every field office in the nation.

Narrator: On this episode of our podcast, we’ll discuss what a JTTF is, how the model came to be, and why it’s stood the test of time. We’ll also discuss why these task forces epitomize interagency partnership in action, how the Headquarters-level National Joint Terrorism Task Force provides essential support to these field-level squads, and how law enforcement agencies across the country can benefit from joining their local JTTF.

This is Inside the FBI.

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Narrator: The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces are our nation’s front line of defense against terrorism, both international and domestic.

They are groups of highly trained, locally based, passionately committed investigators, analysts, linguists, and other specialists from dozens of U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies. When it comes to investigating terrorism, they do it all: chase down leads, gather evidence, make arrests, provide security for special events, collect and share intelligence, and respond to threats and incidents at a moment’s notice.

The JTTF model—an FBI-led, interagency task force based in a Bureau field office or resident agency—came to be in 1980. As FBI Historian Dr. John Fox explains...

FBI Historian Dr. Fox: ...the JTTF model actually came out of an earlier cooperative effort between the FBI and the NYPD.

There were a series of major bank robberies in the late 70s, and both at the national level and at the New York level, they were finding it difficult to deal with at all. We realized that because these bank robberies touched on laws at the state, national, and local levels, that we should be cooperating, we should be sharing information.

If we worked together out of the same place and working the same problems, we could bring the strengths of the state and local level together with that of the federal level. And so, we created, in 1979, a bank robbery task force.

And the model proved so successful that the next year, when a Brink's armored car was robbed by a number of members of a radical group for political purposes—in other words, in a terrorist activity—that we could bring the same model to the problem of terrorism.

Narrator: As the Bureau saw an uptick in nationalist violence on U.S. soil in the early 1980s, the JTTF soon became even more important than the task force that had inspired it. And while the New York Office’s JTTF was initially a collaboration between the FBI and the NYPD, more partner agencies soon joined its ranks.

Fox: Over time, we grew the model into about a dozen of our field offices. It basically grew to the offices that had the biggest terrorist caseloads where we thought that it would be successful.

Narrator: But as terror attacks grew in frequency and magnitude, culminating in the events of September 11, 2001, the Bureau realized that terrorism was a national-level issue that demanded a national-level response. The Bureau soon expanded the JTTF footprint from 35 task forces to mandating that one be created in every FBI field office.

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Narrator: In the four-plus decades since, the JTTF model has not only flourished, but also set the bar for the FBI’s other interagency coalitions. As FBI Assistant Director David J. Scott, who leads the Bureau’s Counterterrorism Division, told us...

Assistant Director David J. Scott: ...I think everybody often looks to the JTTFs to model task forces. It’s like the gold standard.

Narrator: David Goldkopf, an FBI supervisory special agent who oversees the Bureau’s National Joint Terrorism Task Force, supporting 55+ JTTFs across the country, attributes its success to two things.

SSA David Goldkopf: One is the quality of the people that are selected from our partner agencies to represent them on the task force, the fact that they tend to stay for longer periods of time. They understand the unique nature of the work that the FBI does. They understand how to use different capabilities at different levels of government.

The second part is “togetherness”—the fact that we physically sit together, day-in and day-out, and form a cohesive team with a common goal in mind. It doesn't work well if we're trying to do it separately from different offices because the natural conversation and discussion that occurs around the water cooler doesn't happen virtually.

We get high-quality people from our partner agencies that understand their different roles, different capabilities, and how to blend that together with the FBI's roles and capabilities and force-multiply all of our efforts to a common goal.

Narrator: While JTTFs are based in the U.S., their impact, Goldkopf says, is global.

Goldkopf: I think for me, seeing the reach and success of the JTTF model worldwide has been one of the most impressive things that's stuck with me. Every couple of months, we get a call from a legal attaché that wants us to provide a briefing to a local l aw enforcement agency in the country that they're serving in who wants to learn how to build a JTTF model to combat terrorism in their country.

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Narrator: Inside the FBI recently spoke to past and present members of FBI Kansas City's Joint Terrorism Task Force to get their perspectives on the JTTF partnership.

Kansas Bureau of Investigation Director Tony Mattivi—who formerly worked hand-in-hand with the task force as a federal prosecutor—told us that JTTFs are critical in reviewing incoming leads to determine what terrorism threats are substantive. He said these task forces have an obligation to resolve any real or potential threat they’re tipped off to...

Kansas Bureau of Investigation Director Tony Mattivi: ...because you never know which one of those is going to turn into a really significant threat.

It's the job of those agents to discern which of those leads is somebody who could really pose a danger to our country, and which one is just a keyboard warrior or somebody who has some mental health issues that really need to be addressed.

And that's, I think, some of the most important work that's done on a daily basis inside the JTTF. And nobody sees it.

Manny: I think the most challenging aspect is just making sure that we have exploited every possible threat that there could be in an issue without going too far, because we don't want to miss anything. Because if we miss something, it could be very bad.

Narrator: That’s Manny, a U.S. Army Counterintelligence Command special agent who’s served as an FBI Kansas City JTTF task force officer for about three years.

Manny: But at the same time, once a threat is clear, we want to make sure that we are not targeting people that don't need to be.

Narrator: For the record, the FBI doesn’t investigate ideology—or any other First-Amendment protected activity. However, if someone commits, or plans to commit, a violent act to further their ideology, the Bureau will open an investigation.

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Narrator: Each JTTF agent or task force officer brings unique advantages to the table. Kansas City, Kansas, Police Department Detective Vince Kingston, for example, focuses on background investigations and social-media sleuthing. This skillset is consistent with his love for logical reasoning.

KCKPD Detective Vince Kingston: When I was younger, I would read mystery novels, and I was always interested in kind of solving riddles, solving puzzles. So that's another thing that drew me into law enforcement.

Narrator: Barry Berglund—a retired Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department detective who spent two decades on the same JTTF—came to the task force with arguably the most eclectic background of all...

Retired KCMPD Officer Barry Berglund: I had been several things in my lifetime.

I'd been a wildlife biologist.

I'd been a special agent with U.S. Army Criminal Investigations. I investigated serial crimes— serial homicides and sex crimes.

Then, I joined the police department, and I did about seven years as a standard patrol officer. , I went inside and worked for the chief under special investigations.

And then, I came here. So, I came with a lot of interviewing and interrogating experience, and how to put case files together—stuff like that. And I was super-familiar with the city.

Narrator: According to Kansas City JTTF boss and FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jake Foiles, that variety of experience and expertise helps the whole team.

SSA Jake Foiles: I think one of my goals as the supervisor of this squad has been to ensure that everyone on the JTTF knows that their contributions and their feedback and their perspective is valuable. We all will benefit from all of us contributing and being involved and weighing in on all of these different cases, because we all come from different backgrounds.

Narrator: Regardless of their background, once task force officers join a JTTF, their job is to investigate cases as scrupulously as ever. Bobby, a former NYPD officer who served on the FBI New York JTTF, recalled:

Bobby: While still NYPD, assigned to the New York Office JTTF, and working the 9/11 attack, they brought in all these new NYPD detectives. I remember there was seasoned NYPD detectives who had worked high crime areas and were brought in. And two of them came up to me one day and said, “So, how do we do this?”

And I said, “Terrorism is just a different word for murder, homicide. You're going to work it the same exact way. But now, you're doing it on the federal level. Could mean you wake up one morning and you're in Africa, not in New York City. You know, you bring your experience to the task force.

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Narrator: For all agencies, JTTF membership can mean new and different investigative resources, access to intelligence, or paths to prosecution they might have otherwise lacked.

For example, if a tip comes to the FBI about a state or local violation, our agents can share it with the appropriate TFO colleague for action.

Dana Kreeger, a retired FBI special agent and Kansas City JTTF veteran, said the ultimate benefit of JTTF membership is a firsthand, timely understanding of the terrorism threat.

Retired FBI Special Agent Dana Kreeger: Terrorism is not a local threat. It's happening all across the country. A lot of it is intertwined. We have threat actors in Kansas City that might be talking to threat actors in Chicago or L.A. or Portland or New York.

Yes, we can come down to your local police department and provide you a brief and give you an update on these cases. But if you don't have an officer here every day working with us, getting that real-time intelligence, there's going to be that lag time. And so, the value is having somebody here seeing the national and international picture.

Narrator: It’s also worth noting that partnerships forged via JTTF membership don’t just support terrorism investigations. As Vince, the KCKPD detective, explains...

KCKPD Detective Vince Kingston: ...the FBI here in Kansas City definitely has a robust Evidence Response Team that my department has utilized several times, and my department can always call me if they ever need any resources like that. Just last year, there was a homicide that occurred in our city. They believe the suspect had fled to Mexico.

Through my contacts here at the FBI, I was able to get a hold of somebody with Customs and Border Protection, and they were actually able to pull up video footage of the suspect crossing the border from the U.S. And that was crucial to their investigation because they were able to direct their resources down to finding the suspect in Mexico.

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Narrator: The FBI also reinforces the capabilities and resources of field-level JTTFs through its National Joint Terrorism Task Force. This Headquarters-level coalition houses representatives from the FBI and 35 partners agencies under a singular roof in the National Capital Region.

From this hub, NJTTF task force officers—who represent various Department of Justice agencies, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Defense’s civilian law enforcement agencies, to name a few—provide supplemental expertise to field-level agents and task force officers. These experts can also direct additional resources or personnel their way, as a given investigation or crisis response demands.

As David Goldkopf, the supervisory special agent who oversees this national-level task force—says:

Goldkopf: The unique nature of the NJTTF is such that we don't conduct the investigations; we support the investigations. Our field offices and the JTTFs across the country are the ones leading that front line of the investigative process, and we're here to support them in that effort.

Narrator: According to Tom—a U.S. Capitol Police officer and the longest-serving task force officer on the national squad—agencies who lend personnel to the NJTTF benefit from the brain trust just as much as the field-level task forces do.

Tom: It’s not only the access to the federal side of it. It’s the access to every member within that task force. Some agencies bring a tiny, but very specialized, piece that you might not have access to as a county sheriff's department in X state.

Narrator: And, he said, networking with one TFO can unwittingly connect you to numerous subject-matter experts within their home agency’s circles.

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Narrator: So, what can other law enforcement agencies learn from the JTTF model?

Here’s Tony Mattivi again:

Mattivi: I think the two keys are collaboration and communication. The JTTF really operates at a couple of different levels. The whole thing really is a three-dimensional chess game.

You have the operational aspect of it, and then, you have the supervisory—or the executive aspect of it—right?

From an operational perspective, you have agents from the federal government, agents from the state government, detectives, deputies from local agencies, all working together on a regular basis.

But then, you also have the executive board.

Narrator: JTTF executive boards include leaders from all agencies who participate in a given task force. These groups convene regularly to receive updates on the JTTF’s efforts.

Mattivi: And from my perspective now, as an agency head, that's especially important. It's great that the leadership in the FBI recognizes the importance of that, because what they're asking the local or the state partners to do is to give up a resource. And so, for an agency to give up a resource to dedicate an agent or an officer to a task force, that's a big ask. But the FBI realizes that, and the SAC pays that back by saying, “Come in and let us brief you on what's going on. Let's tell you how we're using this resource. Let's see what sort of information we're gathering that can be useful to you on a daily basis outside of the JTTF environment.”

Narrator: David Goldkopf echoed that dedication to meeting JTTF member agencies where they’re at.

Goldkopf: There are funding issues that some of our partners face. There are staffing issues that a lot of our partners face, and we recognize that. And there are ways, through partnership and through membership on the JTTF, that we can assist.

Our role is in the FBI, as a whole is, to share as much information as we can—obviously, within our policies and what doesn't affect investigations. But with law enforcement partners across the country, your knowledge of your local area that you patrol day-in and day-out has the unique ability to inform and assist an investigation that may not help if you're not a part of that task force.

I would encourage those agencies that don't have a relationship with their local office to reach out, introduce themselves, talk to the special agent in charge of the office about becoming a better partner in a collaborative nature, and then explore the opportunities to be a part of the JTTF.

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Narrator: You can visit fbi.gov/terrorism to learn more about the Bureau’s counterterrorism efforts.

This has been another production of Inside the FBI.

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On behalf of the FBI’s Office of Public Affairs, thanks for tuning in.

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