Our People & Capabilities
Our People and Capabilities
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FBI employees in Albany possess the knowledge and experience necessary to protect you, your families, and your workplaces from a full range of national security threats and major crime problems.
Our employees include not only special agents, but a variety of specialized professionals such as intelligence and financial analysts, investigative specialists, support services technicians, language specialists, paralegal specialists, electronics technicians, and security experts.
Our strength lies in our investigations—the very heart of our operations—and in the collection, analysis, and sharing of intelligence that drives and supports those investigations both locally and nationally. In every case, we work to objectively gather the facts and develop evidence that can stand up in a court of law. To do that, we interview witnesses, run undercover operations, analyze financial records, map and manage crime scenes, develop informants, make arrests, conduct surveillance, and gather information and intelligence from around the globe. Our cases today are often complex and multi-faceted, involving a range of public and private sector partners covering multiple jurisdictions in both New York state and Vermont.
Among our specialized capabilities:
- Evidence recovery and processing: In Albany, we have an eight-member Evidence Response Team (ERT) made up of special agents and other specialists who are sent to crime scenes to secure the area and exhaustively gather and process physical evidence. Each ERT member has a forensic specialty and has been extensively trained. Team members take photographs, diagram and survey scenes, gather fingerprints, analyze blood stains and splatters, determine bullet trajectories, recover DNA, gather and process the smallest of clues, and more. The team coordinates with the FBI Laboratory and assists local law enforcement agencies upon request.
- Computer forensics: We also have a Computer Analysis and Response Team (CART) that applies this same evidentiary concept to the digital world. Its forensic examiners are experts at retrieving evidence from a vast array of digital devices, at processing that evidence in a way that maintains its integrity for use in court, and at presenting the results of their findings to investigators.
- Tactical support and crisis response: We have a 12-member Specialized Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team that can storm barricaded buildings and vehicles, breach locks and other structures, arrest armed and dangerous criminals, rescue hostages, patrol areas and provide security, navigate tough terrains by climbing and rappelling, use special techniques to stop fleeing cars, and conduct site surveys for special events. Team members are highly trained and well equipped and possess expertise with a variety of weapons, including pistols, shotguns, and assault and sniper rifles.
- Bomb recovery and analysis: We have one special agent bomb technician in Albany who can test and render safe a variety of explosive devices. The bomb technician responds to calls of suspicious packages or objects and is deployed during bombing investigations, often working closely with our Joint Terrorism Task Force. This individual gathers diagnostic information from the explosives that may be relayed as vital intelligence to local investigators and to the National Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center. Our bomb technician often works and trains with local first responders and law enforcement.
- Hazardous materials: In Albany we have a Weapons of Mass Destruction coordinator who responds to terrorist attacks and criminal incidents involving hazardous materials—including chemical, biological, and radiological—and works in concert with local officials and with experts at FBI Headquarters.
- Translation: Our language specialists translate written documents and audio files in a variety of languages for terrorism, espionage, and criminal cases. They also assist agents in investigations, translating during live interviews and even during undercover operations.
- Crisis negotiators: The Albany Division has a cadre of highly trained special agents who make up our crisis negotiation team, responding to crisis and hostage situations within Albany's territory. The team also may be called upon to address kidnapping and hostage matters that involve Americans overseas. Our negotiators provide training to state and local law enforcement personnel.
- Medical care: The division has a special agent who is credentialed to provide emergency medical care during crisis responses, special operations, terrorism incidents, or high-risk events. We also have a nationally registered paramedic and emergency medical technician who provides medical support as needed during FBI operations and works with local/regional medical facilities to ensure access to definitive care.
- Victim assistance: We have a victim specialist who provides support to individuals who have suffered physical, emotional, and/or financial harm as a result of the commission of a federal crime (violent crime, severe trauma, acts of terrorism, and/or fraud). This specialist, working with other victim specialists in the U.S. Department of Justice, is available to personally assist victims of federal crimes investigated in the Albany Division. Victims are notified of important case events and receive information about a wide range of victim assistance services in their area. Some of these services include: state crime victim compensation programs, rape crisis centers, homicide bereavement support groups, mental health counseling, and special services for child victims.
For more information on the FBI and its capabilities, see our About Us webpage.
