Benito A. Perez

As Chief, Office of Law Enforcement (OLE), Benito A. Perez directs the work of the Service’s special agents and wildlife inspectors in enforcing the Nation’s wildlife protection laws.  He also oversees the National Fish and Wildlife Forensics Laboratory in Oregon and the National Wildlife Property and Eagle Repositories in Colorado.
 
Perez served previously as OLE’s deputy chief, providing national oversight for the operational aspects of the law enforcement program.  He also guided OLE’s strategic and workforce planning efforts and directed OLE as acting chief for a year before being appointed chief in October 2007.

From 2001 to 2004, Perez was the Special Agent in Charge for law enforcement operations in Region One.  Investigations conducted under his leadership brought the shooter of an endangered California condor to justice; exposed the large-scale theft of archeological resources from public lands in Nevada and California; and broke up trafficking in endangered species artifacts, snakehead fish, rare reptiles, and leopard sharks.  He also served as incident commander for the team of special agents deployed to keep the peace at Upper Klamath Lake in the summer of 2001.

Perez’s managerial background includes earlier service as the deputy assistant director for law enforcement and work as both the Special Agent in Charge and a senior special agent with OLE’s Branch of Investigations, a headquarters unit responsible for policy oversight and field support.  From 1988 to 1998, he worked as a field investigator in Los Angeles and Dallas.

A native of Texas, Perez began his law enforcement career in 1973 with that State’s Department of Public Safety.  He became a game warden with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department in 1978 and spent 10 years enforcing wildlife laws along the Texas coast before joining the Service as a special agent in 1988.

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