GREENBELT, Md. - The National Guard Counterdrug Program has employed criminal analysts in Title 32 status since 1994 in support of local, state and federal agencies' ongoing efforts to combat drug trafficking in the 13 jurisdictions of Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia.
Last year, interagency cooperation at the Washington/Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) led to $30 million worth of illegal drugs seized by law enforcement.
HIDTA is not an agency, rather a program guided through the Office of National Drug Control Policy out of the executive office of the President.
"The purpose was to establish a coordinated effort among local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies to focus on drug problems confronting a particular region," said Thomas Carr, director of the Baltimore/Washington HIDTA. "This is not a cookie cutter program. Each HIDTA tailors the needs of its region to properly focus on its threats."
According to HIDTA's 2007 threat assessment, the serious drug threats in this area are crack, cocaine, heroin, marijuana, PCP and methamphetamine, which predominately come from Atlanta, Los Angeles, New York and Miami.
The National Guard is just one of the 134 participating agencies working to thwart drug trafficking and drug use. Others include: the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; Federal Bureau of Investigation; Virginia State Police; and the Baltimore County Police Department.
"The biggest support we provide at the HIDTA is the direct support with our National Guard analysts, who are working side-by-side with law enforcement," said Air Guard Lt. Col. Preston Brown, operations support branch chief for the National Guard Bureau's counterdrug division.
When law enforcement officers begin a case, it starts with the arrest of an individual or surveillance of a certain location. Tips from citizens are one example that leads to surveillance of a person or site, explained Mike, a detective from the Maryland State Police Drug Enforcement Division for the HIDTA group. Then, an agency representative will call the Watch Center located in the HIDTA.
"Right away we have to run deconfliction because we don't know if we're working the same case as someone else," he said. "It's mostly for safety, we don't want to hurt each other or have a police on police situation."
The Watch Center is where several National Guard analysts work with other agency analysts to input data about personnel or locations involved in a narcotics or money laundering scheme. The Deconfliction Event Information System is constantly updated to alert staff about upcoming high-risk events like the execution of a search warrant, according to HIDTA's Web site.
"While we are working the case, they are linking this person with this person, and we wouldn't know about any of it without the (HIDTA's) databases and the research they do for us," the detective stated.
Furthermore, the National Guard provides surveillance and other support to detectives in case analysis.
"If we have several people involved in a crime, analysts will go ahead and break it down, go through phone records, do mapping, do aerial photographs, pictures of any areas, stuff like that," said Mike.
Military technology is fast becoming mission essential to National Guard criminal analysts at the HIDTA. Over the past few years, counterdrug leadership has worked to implement the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet) system into HIDTAs across the nation to transmit classified information.
The capabilities of the SIPRNet are still being finessed within the HIDTAs as National Guard Counterdrug Soldiers and Airmen are trained to use the Department of Defense's secure computer network.
"SIPRNet has a feature similar to Lexis/Nexis that is a database used to search for investigations and arrest records of individuals with questionable immigration status that may be involved in terrorism or narcotics trafficking," said Brown. "That feature, plus access to other secure databases and forums will really elevate the capabilities of the National Guard criminal analysts in their support to law enforcement."
National Guard analysts said they are proud of the work they do because they know they're making a difference everyday in the lives of law enforcement officers and helping the fight against illicit drugs in this country.
"Everything we do, whether the results come back to us or not, helps keep drugs off the street," said Staff Sgt. William, criminal analyst with the Maryland Army National Guard.
"National Guard personnel are a crucial tool for law enforcement, without them we couldn't do a lot of what we do," Mike said. "It's nice to give them the ball and they run with it while we work a case. They're very very helpful."
"I feel privileged to be able to do something like this. It really is a great honor," said William.
For more information about the HIDTA program, visit the Web site at: http://www.hidta.org/.
Editor's Note: Due to operational security and the safety of detectives and criminal analysts working in counterdrug missions, full names and photographs of personnel cannot be released.