June 11, 2024

The Badge of Wisdom: Pete Forcelli on Leadership, Whistleblowing, and the Challenges of Modern Policing

The Badge of Wisdom: Pete Forcelli on Leadership, Whistleblowing, and the Challenges of Modern Policing

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What if the badge you wear symbolizes more than authority, but a lifetime of wisdom and responsibility? Join us for an engrossing conversation with Pete Furselli, a distinguished law enforcement veteran, as he recounts his 35-year journey from the gritty streets of the Bronx to leading roles in the ATF across North America. Pete shares gripping tales from his career, from handling homicide cases to managing high-profile incidents like the Parkland and Pulse nightclub shootings. Gain invaluable insights into the significance of the badge, the evolution of law enforcement culture, and the critical lessons Pete imparts to new recruits.

Effective leadership is the cornerstone of a successful law enforcement career, and this episode dives deep into what makes a great leader. Drawing from my own experiences, I reveal the importance of truly listening to your team, respecting dissenting opinions, and shunning authoritarian clichés. The conversation takes a compelling turn as we discuss my time as a supervisor in Phoenix, navigating the complex Fast and Furious investigation. We explore the necessity of understanding your team on a personal level to foster collaboration and accountability, ensuring fairness and trust.

Lastly, we confront the emotional and financial ramifications of whistleblowing within the U.S. justice system, featuring a poignant narrative of integrity and resilience. Pete sheds light on the personal sacrifices made when standing up for what is right, including the toll it takes on one’s family. We also reflect on the enduring love for the law enforcement profession despite facing significant adversities and societal challenges. This episode underscores the need for community support and realistic expectations of officers, highlighting the thin line between maintaining and restoring order. Don’t miss this heartfelt discussion that emphasizes the profound commitment required to serve and protect.

As a First Responder, you are critical in keeping our communities safe. However, the stress and trauma of the job can take a toll on your mental health and family life.

If you're interested in personal coaching, contact Jerry Lund at 801-376-7124. Let's work together to get you where you want to be and ensure a happy and healthy career.


Podcast Website www.enduringthebadgepodcast.com/
Podcast Instagram www.instagram.com/enduringthebadgepodcast/
Podcast Facebook www.facebook.com/EnduringTheBadgePodcast/
Podcast Calendar https://calendly.com/enduringthebadge/enduring-the-badge-podcast
Personal Coaching https://calendly.com/enduringthebadge/15min
Host Instagram www.instagram.com/jerryfireandfuel/
Host Facebook www.facebook.com/jerrydeanlund

As a First Responder, you are critical in keeping our communities safe. However, the stress and trauma of the job can take a toll on your mental health and family life.

If you're interested in personal coaching, contact Jerry Lund at 435-476-6382. Let's work together to get you where you want to be to ensure a happy and healthy career.


Podcast Website www.enduringthebadgepodcast.com/
Podcast Instagram www.instagram.com/enduringthebadgepodcast/
Podcast Facebook www.facebook.com/EnduringTheBadgePodcast/
Podcast Calendar https://calendly.com/enduringthebadge/enduring-the-badge-podcast
Personal Coaching https://calendly.com/enduringthebadge/15min
Host Instagram www.instagram.com/jerryfireandfuel/
Host Facebook www.facebook.com/jerrydeanlund

Chapters

00:14 - Law Enforcement Wisdom and Communication Skills

09:36 - Learning From Leaders

21:40 - Whistleblower Faces Government Retaliation

31:11 - Challenges and Advocacy in Law Enforcement

39:18 - Podcast Guest Thank-You and Information

Transcript
WEBVTT

00:00:02.706 --> 00:00:05.052
Welcome to today's episode of Enduring the Badge podcast.

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I'm your host, jerry Dean Lund, and if you haven't already done so, please take out your phone and hit that subscribe button.

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I don't want you to miss an upcoming episode.

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And, hey, while your phone's out, please give us a rating and review.

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On whichever platform you listen to this podcast on, such as iTunes, apple Podcasts and Spotify, it helps this podcast grow and the reason why, when this gets positive ratings and reviews, those platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify show this to other people that never listened to this podcast before, and that allows our podcast to grow and make more of an impact on other people's lives.

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So if you would do that, I would appreciate that from the bottom of my heart.

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My very special guest today is Pete Furselli.

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How are you doing, pete Good?

00:00:45.005 --> 00:00:46.460
good Thanks for having me Honored to be here.

00:00:47.021 --> 00:00:48.746
Yeah, thank you for being on, Pete.

00:00:48.746 --> 00:00:50.551
Can you tell the audience a little bit about yourself?

00:00:51.820 --> 00:00:57.353
Sure, I spent 35 years in law enforcement, started back in the Bronx in the late 80s 1987 to be exact.

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Walked the beat Back then cops actually walked the beat Did it in the projects.

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Did it for a couple of years actually.

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Then eventually made my way into a sector car handling, 911 jobs.

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About seven years into my career made it into the Detective Bureau.

00:01:12.543 --> 00:01:17.667
Spent my last eight years as a detective with the Housing Authority Police Department and then the NYPD.

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After Giuliani merged the three departments together and then jumped ship in June of 2001.

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I became an ATF agent.

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Started in New York as a field agent, working cases mostly the same kind of stuff I was doing as a homicide detective in New York.

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You know, just didn't need to be a gun nexus but you had plenty of gangs using guns to do bad things during those times.

00:01:38.867 --> 00:01:41.093
Went out to Phoenix as a group supervisor for five years.

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Got thrown out of the state of Arizona for blowing a whistle on that Fast and Furious mess.

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Went to headquarters kind of as a punishment.

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Actually Didn't last for long because I had some folks who appreciated that I was honest in my testimony.

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Before Congress Sent up to Canada was a liaison up there for two years with Canadian police on the eastern side of the country.

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An amazing assignment, I mean.

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Canadian cops are the salt of the earth.

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I actually loved working with them, just good people.

00:02:08.210 --> 00:02:10.919
So two years later went down to headquarters.

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I was put in charge of ATF's leadership and professional development division, so training stuff really outside of my wheelhouse, outside of my comfort zone, but I enjoyed the assignment.

00:02:19.111 --> 00:02:21.022
Then I was sent down to Miami.

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I was originally the number two down there, assistant special agent in charge, then got promoted to the special agent in charge job.

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I was down there, unfortunately, for Parkland and the Fort Lauderdale Airport shooting and I was the assistant special agent in charge during the Pulse nightclub shooting.

00:02:35.943 --> 00:02:40.102
So I had a role in that as well, not the shooting itself obviously, but the investigation.

00:02:40.562 --> 00:02:48.768
And then I spent my last four years as the head of training for ATF, which was great because by that time, man, I was like over 30 years in the profession.

00:02:48.768 --> 00:02:56.372
I was kind of beat down and you know from politics and the grind and one of my you know areas was the academy.

00:02:56.372 --> 00:03:05.794
So one month, rather one week a month, I would travel down to Brunswick, georgia, which is where the ATF Academy is, and spend time with the new hires and just talk to them.

00:03:05.794 --> 00:03:19.935
And I tried not to be that pompous bureaucrat from headquarters so I'd really just try to engage with them and just seeing that energy like fresh faces coming on, you know, just really wanting to be good law enforcement officers, recharge my batteries, so it was good.

00:03:20.134 --> 00:03:27.038
But then, you know, got to a point where you know, federally there's a 57 year age requirement to retire.

00:03:27.038 --> 00:03:31.431
I was 55, closing in on 56 and I wanted to go out on my terms.

00:03:31.431 --> 00:03:38.266
So I pulled the pin in October of 21 and now just trying to stay busy being law enforcement's biggest cheerleader when they get it right.

00:03:38.266 --> 00:03:40.989
And look, I've called them out when they get it wrong.

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You know.

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But look, anybody expecting law enforcement to be perfect will always be disappointed, because it's a profession staffed by 99% noble people who are humans.

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You know so.

00:03:52.860 --> 00:03:56.588
But no, it's good to be retired, but I'm not going to lie and say I don't miss the job.

00:03:57.290 --> 00:04:09.706
Yeah, yeah, that is quite a career Quite the right spread across the US and into Canada and stuff like that and different positions, and it's a lot, a lot there to that we could unpack.

00:04:09.706 --> 00:04:21.223
But I kind of want to like talk to you about something you're saying like you know, the, the leadership of the new, the new people coming in, and that, how that rejuvenated your, your battery, like what would?

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What'd you talk to them about?

00:04:23.040 --> 00:04:23.663
Well, a few things actually.

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First I want to go down there you talk to them about.

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Well, a few things actually.

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First I want to go down there and explain to them.

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You know I was blessed in my career to be taught by guys.

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I mean, when I came on as a cop I worked with guys that were around in the Serpico days.

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You know they were the old timers and you know I didn't realize what a gift it was to be around those guys because they had wisdom to share.

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And I'm not trying to say that I was wise at any point in my career, but by the time I was in charge of training, you know I'd learned some things, from my mistakes mostly, but also from seeing some things that others had done and just understanding the culture and how much the culture has changed.

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Just to talk to them about the importance of realizing that the badge is not something that represents power, it really represents responsibility.

00:05:04.750 --> 00:05:13.492
And it was funny because one of the blocks I would always try to go down there, because it's the ATF Academy, it's broken down into many, many different blocks of instruction.

00:05:13.492 --> 00:05:20.663
The ones that the agents loved was the undercover block, because they get to do undercover pseudo like go out there, mock, exercise and everything.

00:05:20.663 --> 00:05:23.944
And then, of course, there was the tactics block, which is a couple of weeks long.

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Where're going?

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You know, doing swap type stuff.

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I used to go down during the interview block.

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I wanted them to realize the importance of interviewing.

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If you're going to be a good cop, you're going to be a good investigator.

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Even if you're a good manager at some point or I hate the term manager leader you need to know how to talk to people and you know, one of the things I really loved about being an investigator was putting the puzzle pieces together.

00:05:47.302 --> 00:05:58.528
But you know, what I would see is a lot of folks were really good on technology or really good with some of the other things, but they weren't always very good at the human interaction and I blame that on just the generation today.

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A lot of it's.

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You know I grew up playing sports in the street, where you know you had to learn how to talk to people.

00:06:04.733 --> 00:06:06.845
You had to learn how to deescalate situations.

00:06:06.845 --> 00:06:09.980
Now I'd see you know younger folks today who you know they.

00:06:09.980 --> 00:06:16.987
They communicate to the person in the cubicle next to them via text instead of getting up and walking over and saying hey, what are we doing for lunch?

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They text each other.

00:06:18.271 --> 00:06:28.896
So I would just go down there, you know, explaining the importance of of relating to people and building rapport and interviewing and then, more importantly or equally as important, following up on that.

00:06:28.896 --> 00:06:31.869
You know, like if somebody tells you something, don't just take it at face value.

00:06:31.869 --> 00:06:33.884
I notice a lot of investigators.

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They get caught up with informants, with everything the informant tells them has to be legit.

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No man go out there and corroborate it.

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I mean, that's what makes you a good investigator.

00:06:42.223 --> 00:06:50.074
But I think you know, talking to people is just the most important skill that any cop or any agent can ever have.

00:06:50.074 --> 00:06:57.396
And then it needs to transfer with you to leadership positions, because you need to listen to your people more importantly than them even sometimes listening to you.

00:06:57.396 --> 00:07:00.766
You know, it's all about serving your folks.

00:07:00.766 --> 00:07:01.869
It's not the other way around.

00:07:01.869 --> 00:07:09.002
When you're, you know when you're a leader.

00:07:09.021 --> 00:07:09.904
Yeah, yeah, definitely, I think you're right.

00:07:09.904 --> 00:07:14.182
There is definitely a different with these different generations, right, different ways of communicating and and that's pros and cons with that.

00:07:14.182 --> 00:07:24.791
But, like like you said, I, the foundation of what even relationships right Is the communication of being able to communicate, whether it's a relationship of interviewing someone or leadership, but you have to be able to communicate.

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Not it's a relationship of interviewing someone or leadership, but you have to be able to communicate.

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Not just send an email, send a text or whatever.

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It's that face-to-face interaction.

00:07:32.805 --> 00:07:34.470
Yeah, yeah and look the most important thing.

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I've learned and this I didn't know right away.

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It took me years to learn it is.

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Listening is more so important than talking sometimes.

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Whether it's in the interview room with a suspect.

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You know those uncomfortable moments of silence are just golden.

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But even you know I see a lot of leaders and I you know, towards the end of my career I dealt with one who, just if you had a one hour meeting with this person, you could expect 57 minutes of him talking at you.

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He'd take a phone call and then give you a minute for you to.

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You know, to summarize and this is instances where you'd have to bring a problem to his attention.

00:08:02.927 --> 00:08:04.430
You're like what's going on here?

00:08:04.430 --> 00:08:07.615
So I just found it was always better to just listen to people.

00:08:07.615 --> 00:08:12.968
I mean, that's how you find out what's happening, that's how you find out about morale, that's how you find out how you can better serve your folks.

00:08:12.968 --> 00:08:17.350
What's happening in your field division or in your area of responsibility?

00:08:17.350 --> 00:08:20.108
Or, as a beat comp, you're going out there talking to people.

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Just, you know, if you listen to them.

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They'll tell you where the problems are.

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But if you're constantly talking at them, they just kind of check out, you know.

00:08:28.074 --> 00:08:34.441
Yeah, why do you think some leaders are like you know, take that approach of just talking, talking, talking and not listening?

00:08:35.985 --> 00:08:37.688
I think it could be a mixture of things.

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Like the gentleman I was speaking about, this is one of the nicest men I've ever met, but his ego was a bit inflated and I think his impression of himself as a leader was as well.

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I just think it depends on the person.

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You know, I found the best leaders to be the most humble people.

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You know, the ones who led by example and the ones who kind of acted as the cushion between the bureaucracy and the madness and their people.

00:09:03.051 --> 00:09:13.291
You know, I mean I try to do that and look if I succeeded, because that's the other thing I always say about leadership you don't get to decide whether or not you were a good leader, right, and neither really do your bosses.

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Your bosses know they tasked you with things to do and whether they were accomplished or not, they can gauge you on that.

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But the only folks who get a vote on whether or not you were a good leader is the folks you led.

00:09:23.746 --> 00:09:31.541
So I just always tried to steal some of the things that I saw from the leaders who I look.

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I'll say it plainly I love them.

00:09:33.190 --> 00:09:43.750
I mean, I worked for some people I would have walked through fire for and I just tried to steal some of the traits, some of the things that they did, sometimes even the language, the stuff, the way they addressed certain things.

00:09:43.750 --> 00:09:47.404
Sometimes even the language, the stuff, the way they addressed certain things.

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Um, and then I also learned a lot from some real assholes.

00:09:48.648 --> 00:09:49.932
Um, but you learn what not to be.

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So I also tried to you know, always keep that in mind as well to not be like those folks, but to be like the really good ones.

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And, um, look, the good ones listened, the good ones wanted to hear what you had to say.

00:10:00.650 --> 00:10:05.947
The good ones actually appreciated and this is something I love respectful dissent.

00:10:05.947 --> 00:10:18.546
For example, when I was in charge of ATF's Miami office, I had two ASACs assistant special agents in charge, both great guys, both very experienced guys, but we didn't always see things the same way.

00:10:18.546 --> 00:10:25.871
There were times where we would really go at it with discussion and sometimes the discussions would get heated, but never like a personal.

00:10:25.871 --> 00:10:26.669
You know what I mean.

00:10:26.669 --> 00:10:30.287
And and and I thought that's what made us a good team is that it was never.

00:10:30.287 --> 00:10:36.284
Yes, sir, you know, in the end there were times where I would disagree with them and look, hey, I'm the sack, I get the final decision.

00:10:36.284 --> 00:10:37.691
This is where we're going to go.

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But it was never like fact.

00:10:43.133 --> 00:10:52.918
I think that when you use the words because I said so that is like you have just failed as a leader, if you throw those words out, as someone who is just trying to find out the why.

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Because hey, look some people, they're not pushing back on you, they just want to know why so they can buy into the mission or buy into the task.

00:11:00.500 --> 00:11:07.765
And so when you're there and you throw it or you point this used to kill me you point to the stripes on your sleeve or the or the collar brass.

00:11:07.765 --> 00:11:12.062
This is why, man, that's just epic fail, just bad stuff.

00:11:12.864 --> 00:11:27.592
Yeah, I think that's really hard to recover from as a leader when you, if you do something to that sorts, I mean, yeah, I mean I think most leaders well, they should appreciate those types of discussions but I feel like often they don't.

00:11:27.592 --> 00:11:32.351
They think it's a challenge and take a personal can take a personal.

00:11:33.080 --> 00:11:34.285
Yeah, well, I think it's insecurity.

00:11:34.285 --> 00:11:43.774
I mean, if you're not a secure leader, you're not going to want to hear somebody push back on you because you think they're pushing back on your authority rather than just wanting to understand things.

00:11:43.774 --> 00:11:48.932
Well, look, I've had some people that work for me who were, you know, boss fighters.

00:11:48.932 --> 00:11:51.187
I mean, anything you said to them, they were going to push back.

00:11:51.187 --> 00:11:55.230
If you handed them a bar of gold, they would complain that you didn't wipe your fingerprints off it.

00:11:55.230 --> 00:11:58.201
So I mean, there's that too, but it's just a matter of knowing your people.

00:11:58.221 --> 00:12:08.836
But going back to what we started with, if you don't communicate with folks and understand them and know what they're about, what makes them tick, you don't, you can't enter into those discussions intelligently because you don't know.

00:12:08.836 --> 00:12:13.250
Like all right, this person just, no matter what I do, there's going to be pushback, you know.

00:12:13.250 --> 00:12:15.085
Or this person just loves the job.

00:12:15.085 --> 00:12:24.592
You know, some people love the job, they get caught up in things, or hey, maybe this person's having some stuff going on at home, right, and I need to keep an eye on him, or he or she, or help them out.

00:12:24.592 --> 00:12:28.428
But if you don't know them, if you're not talking to them, you'll never know those things you know.

00:12:28.448 --> 00:12:34.342
The other thing is, if you're a manager, like at a higher level, trust your managers under you, but also hold them accountable.

00:12:34.342 --> 00:12:38.701
And look the most important thing, this used to drive me nuts hold yourself accountable.

00:12:38.701 --> 00:12:45.433
I'd seen bosses who would bark orders at people and then go out there and just do things that you just actually said.

00:12:45.433 --> 00:12:48.059
Are you kidding me, like that's the boss and that's how they're behaving?

00:12:48.059 --> 00:12:51.870
Cause I find that the higher you move up in an organization, the more eyes are on you.

00:12:52.100 --> 00:12:53.725
Oh, yeah, yeah, and people are watching.

00:12:53.924 --> 00:13:04.711
So I mean when you're telling people to behave a certain way and you're behaving a different way, or you're allowing your buddies to behave a different way because they're not in your you know, rather than have you know you have an inner circle.

00:13:04.711 --> 00:13:06.952
That's always also a recipe for disaster.

00:13:06.952 --> 00:13:08.174
You gotta be fair to everybody.

00:13:08.836 --> 00:13:14.828
Yeah, yeah, talk about communication and let's get into the fast and furious story and what that's about.

00:13:15.870 --> 00:13:16.530
Sure, sure.

00:13:16.530 --> 00:13:34.663
Well, I was a brand new supervisor in Phoenix and I had come from New York and when I was in New York I worked on some cases that really just were amazing cases, and not because I'm special or anything like that, it's because I had a good team, good prosecutors, which is critical to a long-term, larger-scale investigation.

00:13:34.663 --> 00:13:41.148
Because you need things you need court orders sometimes, you need subpoenas, you need grand juries, there's things that you need.

00:13:41.148 --> 00:13:43.677
So I worked on a few big RICO cases.

00:13:43.677 --> 00:13:49.019
They all started as, like, low-level gun cases and we would flip the defendant, go in an interview room, interview them.

00:13:49.019 --> 00:13:53.662
So I mean it all fits into, you know, the bigger process of doing investigations.

00:13:54.129 --> 00:13:59.798
So it was weird that when I got out to Phoenix, what I would see is our agents would do things that agents did all over the country.

00:13:59.798 --> 00:14:16.094
They would pull over cars, right, because we would get tips frequently from gun dealers, like legitimate licensed gun stores, saying, hey, something suspicious with this guy who came in and asked how many AK variant rifles we have on the shelves and we'd say to, whatever the number was, I'll take them all and would hand over a bag of cash.

00:14:16.094 --> 00:14:25.913
So the dealers would call us and we would roll out there, we would set up surveillance and we would watch the transaction happen and we would follow the car off because we'd want to do it in the parking lot and burn the dealer.

00:14:26.134 --> 00:14:27.357
We would always make up a story.

00:14:27.398 --> 00:14:33.179
Hey, we were watching you and we saw you load 13 guns in the car and that's suspicious.

00:14:33.179 --> 00:14:35.144
We would separate folks Again.

00:14:35.144 --> 00:14:36.011
What would cops do?

00:14:36.011 --> 00:14:37.056
Everywhere, all over the country?

00:14:37.056 --> 00:14:38.158
Get different stories.

00:14:38.158 --> 00:14:45.994
You know court of lies, we know where this is going.

00:14:46.014 --> 00:14:49.431
So what I would see in Phoenix is that scenario would unfold time and time and time again and we would always be told well, just, we'll indict it later, let them go.

00:14:49.431 --> 00:14:58.033
So you have these people who are smuggling guns to firearms traffickers, who are bringing guns down to the cartels in Mexico, and it was always kick in the can, let it go, let it go.

00:14:58.033 --> 00:15:06.519
Another example would be we had one guy who he bought a gun and transferred it to another person and that gun, within 48 hours, was used to kill.

00:15:06.519 --> 00:15:12.062
Well, was used, with other guns, to kill 21 people in a town in Mexico called Canadaya.

00:15:12.062 --> 00:15:14.625
So four of those people who were killed were cops.

00:15:14.625 --> 00:15:18.607
Four other cops were taken into the desert and beaten and left for dead.

00:15:18.607 --> 00:15:20.971
So I mean a pretty heinous crime.

00:15:20.971 --> 00:15:25.672
We get confessions from the straw purchaser, the person that illegally bought the gun for the other person.

00:15:25.672 --> 00:15:28.142
We get a confession from the trafficker.

00:15:28.142 --> 00:15:30.311
Well, we're not going to prosecute that case.

00:15:30.311 --> 00:15:31.153
The gun's in Mexico.

00:15:31.153 --> 00:15:33.301
So I'd see this unfold time and time and time again.

00:15:34.129 --> 00:15:40.197
So you know, and my group's initial tasking for my first three years in Phoenix was Mexico-bound firearms trafficking.

00:15:40.197 --> 00:15:43.663
So we seized thousands, literally thousands of guns.

00:15:43.663 --> 00:15:50.418
Not many people went to prison, which is not really a success when you think about it, if you're a federal agent supposed to be making federal cases.

00:15:50.418 --> 00:16:01.761
Some of the cases we were able to take to the county, some we were able to take to the state attorney general's office, but the ones we brought to the US attorney's office, like the federal prosecutors about 90% of them they passed on.

00:16:01.761 --> 00:16:06.721
So anyway, years later, 2009, because I got down here in 2007.

00:16:06.721 --> 00:16:10.801
So in October of 2009, our group's focus was changed.

00:16:10.801 --> 00:16:26.032
We were focused on home invasions and drug robberies, because Phoenix led the United States at that time in home invasions and kidnappings and they were second in this hemisphere behind Mexico City, which is a much, much bigger city than Phoenix.

00:16:26.032 --> 00:16:27.960
So obviously that's not something to be proud of.

00:16:27.960 --> 00:16:32.894
But I had worked on some home invasion cases in New York, so I was like fine.

00:16:32.894 --> 00:16:42.423
So I was kind of excited, different thing to work on something that I had experienced on working on in the past and I was tired of the grind with the US Attorney's Office but they kept turning our cases down.

00:16:42.423 --> 00:16:48.692
But they so they stood up a new group in Phoenix that was tasked with Mexico-bound firearms trafficking.

00:16:49.253 --> 00:16:58.378
Well, after a while we start to hear at these meetings, these numbers, like we're on this case with 600 guns, 900 guns, different meetings, and I'm like, wow, okay, interesting case.

00:16:58.378 --> 00:17:02.224
And I'm thinking that they found this historical treasure trove of documents.

00:17:02.224 --> 00:17:10.049
But as the numbers were going up, it was pretty clear that that's not the case, because I mean, if they found the documents, then you know, keep finding them.

00:17:10.049 --> 00:17:20.154
So, anyway, a little while into it, a Border Patrol agent named Brian Terry gets killed and all of a sudden this water cooler talk starts that they were walking guns and letting them go.

00:17:20.154 --> 00:17:29.925
And then around this time we start getting calls from the dealers that used to call us, because what happened is, when we would seize the guns, they would never have to be traced because we knew exactly where they came from.

00:17:29.925 --> 00:17:38.298
Well, the dealers were like, hey man, why, all of a sudden, with this new group, are we getting phone calls from ATF saying the gun was recovered in Mexico?

00:17:38.298 --> 00:17:40.843
Like with us, nobody went to jail.

00:17:40.843 --> 00:17:42.045
But the guns were in our vault.

00:17:42.045 --> 00:17:45.579
They weren't used to shoot some cop or some kid or you know whatever.

00:17:46.810 --> 00:17:57.182
So but it was around this time that an agent named John Dodson, who was in that group, who knew what was going on, contacted Senator Chuck Grassley's office and said that ATF was walking guns.

00:17:57.182 --> 00:18:22.044
So now I'm at a subsequent meeting and the special agent in charge of the Phoenix field division who was a nice man, I would argue, very inexperienced when it came to street work he came in and told us hey, the US attorney's office same US attorney's office that declined all of those cases I was talking about was very upset with John Dodson for contacting Senator Grassley's office and don't be surprised if he finds himself indicted.

00:18:22.044 --> 00:18:24.499
I'd stay away from him, or some words to that effect.

00:18:24.499 --> 00:18:33.875
I remember going home that night, not very happy obviously, and talking to my wife and explaining what happened, all those cases that were declined.

00:18:33.875 --> 00:18:46.797
And now they're talking about indicting John who who, candidly, I didn't even know I don't know if I ever even was on the shooting range with him ever never had a conversation with him, but again, I didn't think it was right.

00:18:46.797 --> 00:18:47.259
So we had a discussion.

00:18:47.278 --> 00:18:52.634
The very following morning I called Senator Grassley's office and said hey, listen, I spoke to a guy named Brian Downey who was one of his staffers.

00:18:53.194 --> 00:19:01.731
I said, brian, I know you're being told that by Eric Holder and by ATF and the Department of Justice that ATF doesn't walk guns and that John Knott's is a liar.

00:19:02.914 --> 00:19:10.373
I'm just letting you know he's not lying and if you give me a subpoena, I'll tell you everything you want to know about what's been happening in Phoenix over the past couple of years.

00:19:10.373 --> 00:19:13.868
And lo and behold, a couple of weeks later I get a phone call.

00:19:13.868 --> 00:19:25.453
I'm sitting at my desk and it was another gentleman from Congress, a staffer named Colton Davis, and he's like Mr Friselli, we have a subpoena here for you.

00:19:25.453 --> 00:19:34.515
You can either come downstairs to the hotel across the street, which was a Hyatt, from our office, we can come up to the ninth floor and serve you there, or we can come out to your house and serve you there.

00:19:34.515 --> 00:19:38.934
I was like, hey, I'll be right down and took possession of the subpoena.

00:19:38.934 --> 00:19:47.730
And that's kind of where the journey began, as far as you know, blowing the whistle and speaking about what happened there and you know, and then the retaliation that followed.

00:19:47.730 --> 00:19:54.635
It all began with, you know them talking about indicting John when for years they weren't indicting criminals.

00:19:57.232 --> 00:19:58.417
Why was the sudden switch?

00:20:00.270 --> 00:20:00.832
That you know.

00:20:00.832 --> 00:20:02.857
That's something I never found out.

00:20:02.857 --> 00:20:03.881
Why was it for years?

00:20:03.881 --> 00:20:09.494
Once the gun made its way to Mexico, we were told they couldn't prosecute because the corpus delecti, the body of the crime, was in Mexico.

00:20:09.494 --> 00:20:12.371
I mean, this was many, many, many defendants, mind you.

00:20:12.371 --> 00:20:16.007
Now, all of a sudden, the strategy is to let the guns go to Mexico.

00:20:16.007 --> 00:20:18.575
So I mean, we were never told why that would happen.

00:20:18.935 --> 00:20:24.682
There were rumblings that one of the things that they were looking to do was to implement this thing called Demand Letter 3.

00:20:24.682 --> 00:20:29.871
And this, when I say they, that's not Phoenix, I mean this was people in the Department of Justice.

00:20:29.871 --> 00:20:42.172
The way it works is and I don't know if your listeners might know if you go into a gun store and you buy two pistols, you have to fill out a multiple sale form, right, so you can buy a pistol and that form is not filled up.

00:20:42.172 --> 00:20:50.157
If you go in and buy a bunch of rifles, like those people were doing who were coming up from Mexico, you also didn't have to fill out a multiple sale form.

00:20:50.157 --> 00:20:51.801
It only applied to two pistols.

00:20:51.801 --> 00:21:23.137
So while Fast and Furious was going on, the brass was kind of gleeful in this idea, like, hey, we can implement this multiple sale form for rifles now, and they in fact did as a result of Fast and Furious, where now it's not a national thing, but if you buy more than one rifle in a border state so Texas, new Mexico, arizona, california you have to fill out this form now, which is kind of sickening if you think about it, because, look, a lot of people in Mexico were killed with guns that were smuggled during Fast and Furious.

00:21:23.137 --> 00:21:27.978
Helicopters were downed with rifles, .50 caliber rifles that were smuggled as part of Fast and

00:21:27.999 --> 00:21:28.398
Furious.

00:21:28.398 --> 00:21:50.492
And Brian Terry, who was a Border Patrol agent with BORTAC, which is like the elite of the elite of the Border Patrol, right, you think about Uvalde, that school shooting standoff, right, if you remember, while the cops were standing there not you know kind of deciding a plan, a border patrol BORTAC guy blasted past them, went in and ended the threat, right, these guys are like the high-speed elite SWAT guys.

00:21:50.492 --> 00:21:55.063
I'd put them up against FBI's HRT, and Brian was one of those guys.

00:21:55.063 --> 00:21:57.134
And here he's killed in the desert, you know.

00:21:57.134 --> 00:22:06.971
So the government never explained to the family as to why or what, but if it was to implement this demand letter three, I can't think of anything more appalling.

00:22:06.971 --> 00:22:08.575
But again, I mean, he's dead.

00:22:08.575 --> 00:22:14.838
The family wasn't told what was going on and the US attorney's office was thinking of indicting John Dodson

00:22:14.878 --> 00:22:15.259
perhaps.

00:22:15.259 --> 00:22:17.773
And I was like this is just a bridge too far for me as a leader.

00:22:17.773 --> 00:22:22.604
There's no way I could stay there and just keep my mouth shut about it.

00:22:22.604 --> 00:22:33.280
And then the other thing is and it really weighed on me is I watched my agents do everything the right way Stop cars, ask questions, gather evidence and always be told no.

00:22:33.280 --> 00:22:38.933
So I was like I had a pretty good run in New York and it was because of those partnerships.

00:22:38.933 --> 00:22:49.115
I watched my agents do what they were supposed to do and realized they'll never reach their full potential, not because of them, but because of the prosecutors.

00:22:49.115 --> 00:22:52.452
So I mean there were so many things that weighed into why it was the right thing to do.

00:22:52.452 --> 00:22:54.779
But yeah, I did.

00:22:54.779 --> 00:23:02.134
It Turned into like a four-year ordeal afterwards to clear my name, because US attorneys always didn't like the allegations being levied at them.

00:23:02.134 --> 00:23:08.442
So you know, obviously they turned around and made some counterclaims, all of which proved to be untrue, but it took four years to do it.

00:23:10.171 --> 00:23:14.280
Yeah, how did that weigh on you and your family during those four years.

00:23:14.280 --> 00:23:15.343
That had to be rough.

00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:17.011
Oh, it was rough.

00:23:17.011 --> 00:23:18.395
And you bring up the important thing.

00:23:18.395 --> 00:23:24.391
It's like is like, look, I raised my hand and took an oath and I mean I never expected to go through something like that, nor would I want to ever again.

00:23:24.391 --> 00:23:25.894
But my family didn't.

00:23:25.894 --> 00:23:29.672
So I mean, you know, I moved them from the northeast, they came with me to arizona.

00:23:29.672 --> 00:23:34.250
So they know we didn't have family in phoenix and we were alone out there and they had arrived that storm.

00:23:34.250 --> 00:23:50.434
So I mean I wound up getting surveilled where you know there were times we'd go to dinner and there were people like and not covert surveillance, I mean like overt, like hey, man, we're watching you kind of surveillance which was really unnerving for two kids who were like one was high school age, the other one was about to enter high school age.

00:23:50.434 --> 00:23:52.800
So I mean that was that was rough.

00:23:52.800 --> 00:24:01.330
And then you know, the other thing is, because you're being surveilled, my lawyer was on the on the East Coast.

00:24:01.330 --> 00:24:02.272
I'm in Phoenix, I know how the government works.

00:24:02.272 --> 00:24:05.299
So I wasn't going to communicate with the lawyer by email or by phone.

00:24:05.299 --> 00:24:09.096
So traveling back and forth to see the attorney got real expensive.

00:24:09.096 --> 00:24:12.990
So we almost frankly were bankrupted by the whole ordeal.

00:24:13.531 --> 00:24:17.319
But in the end, again, I was able to exonerate myself.

00:24:17.319 --> 00:24:33.433
But I mean there was a point where in that four-year period, on six different occasions, when the US Attorney's Office would make allegations that– they couldn't prove, but it was like kind of he said, you know, he said, he said, or whatever I would, I would say hey look, if you don't believe me, put me on a polygraph.

00:24:33.433 --> 00:24:38.971
To the inspector general's office, which, as a federal agent, is risky Cause if you fail a polygraph they're pulling your security clearance.

00:24:38.971 --> 00:24:43.867
And I happen to know enough to know that the polygraph is not the most reliable device.

00:24:43.867 --> 00:24:48.453
But I just I was so backed into the corner that I didn't know what else, frankly, to do.

00:24:48.534 --> 00:24:52.740
And I would have taken it, but each time I would say hey put me on the box, their response would be no.

00:24:52.759 --> 00:24:53.726
No, that's not necessary.

00:24:53.726 --> 00:24:59.185
We haven't gotten there yet, Mr Friselli, but it made for a difficult four years, to say the least.

00:25:00.048 --> 00:25:08.211
Yeah, I bet that would put a strain on your family dynamics, your relationship with your wife probably never feeling comfortable.

00:25:08.211 --> 00:25:13.874
If you're being watched all the time like that, that's got to be very, very unnerving for them.

00:25:13.874 --> 00:25:18.971
Like you said, because they didn't sign up for that right, I can't, did you?

00:25:18.971 --> 00:25:25.113
I'm assuming you discussed this with your wife before you said, hey, I'm going to do this and this is what could possibly happen well.

00:25:25.192 --> 00:25:33.479
Actually, when I went home and told her what they were doing to john and then I was contemplating reaching out to grassley's office her response was my wife's no joke man.

00:25:33.479 --> 00:25:35.090
My wife grew up in the Bronx.

00:25:35.090 --> 00:25:35.772
She's a tough cookie.

00:25:35.772 --> 00:25:37.893
She's like hey, if you don't, you're not the man I married.

00:25:37.893 --> 00:25:46.827
My family always expected me to do the right thing and the amazing thing was, through this all, she stayed by my side and my kids were also very supportive.

00:25:47.268 --> 00:25:51.836
But it wasn't easy for that man Like we I wound up having a porn jewelry to make the mortgage payment.

00:25:51.836 --> 00:25:59.707
Like I had watches I had collected as a detective that I just I was, you know, I mean prized possessions.

00:25:59.707 --> 00:26:00.067
They were gone.

00:26:00.067 --> 00:26:08.067
My grandfather's rifle that he left me when he passed gone had a pawn that we got to the point where we were holding yard sales in the driveway where you know I used to love to work with my hands.

00:26:08.067 --> 00:26:21.501
When you buy a drill for like $150 and you're trying to sell it for 50 because you got to make a mortgage payment and the guy standing there trying to bargain you down from 50 to 15, it's incredibly humbling and it sucked.

00:26:21.501 --> 00:26:22.809
I mean I don't know how else to say it.

00:26:23.705 --> 00:26:33.121
But I think seeing that in a weird way gave my kids and my wife a resilience that they wouldn't have had otherwise.

00:26:33.121 --> 00:26:35.791
So I mean, look, I think as a family we learned a lot from it.

00:26:35.791 --> 00:26:47.228
But look, if my kids because they're both in law enforcement now if they came up to me and said hey, should I blow the whistle on this or that, I'm not going to lie and say absolutely, I would probably try to talk them out of it.

00:26:47.228 --> 00:26:55.180
Because the weirdest thing is I still speak to people in Phoenix and the US Attorney's Office there hasn't gotten any better.

00:26:55.180 --> 00:26:59.376
So the same stuff that I blew the whistle on may not be going on to the same extent.

00:26:59.376 --> 00:27:06.291
And obviously no more Border Patrol agents have been killed, but they're not doing their job any better now than they were then.

00:27:06.291 --> 00:27:09.769
So I mean, in some ways it's kind of sad that a lot of it was all for nothing.

00:27:10.810 --> 00:27:22.734
Yeah, that's extremely sad because that is a really rough thing to go through, yeah, and then not make any change.

00:27:22.734 --> 00:27:27.969
It sucked, yeah, yeah, I've just sometimes I hear these type of stories, you know, from guests.

00:27:27.969 --> 00:27:36.868
I'm like I'm trying to like imagine, you know, I'm sitting here in my office and I'm looking outside and thinking, you know, like, wow, you know, holding a garage still to to make my mortgage payment, like what would that look like?

00:27:36.868 --> 00:27:40.257
Like, how would I, how would I feel, how would my family feel?

00:27:40.257 --> 00:27:41.786
Like what you know.

00:27:41.786 --> 00:27:46.392
And then the other thing is as much as we would hate to say is like what are other people thinking about me?

00:27:47.814 --> 00:27:57.807
You know it's funny because in the beginning I think some people thought, like you know, because, look, nobody believed.

00:27:57.807 --> 00:27:59.857
This is the weird thing when John Dodson blew the whistle on people walking guns, nobody believed John.

00:27:59.857 --> 00:28:00.621
Right, we didn't believe John.

00:28:00.621 --> 00:28:01.345
We weren't in that group.

00:28:01.345 --> 00:28:04.734
They were doing things in that group that just went against the grain of everything we do.

00:28:04.734 --> 00:28:08.209
So, you know, once I found out it was happening, I stepped forward as well.

00:28:08.209 --> 00:28:13.017
But there were people in other parts of the country within ATF and certainly the people outside of ATF.

00:28:13.017 --> 00:28:17.175
When other law enforcement entities heard that guns were being walked, they were like what are you people crazy?

00:28:17.175 --> 00:28:21.369
But I mean that same dynamic applied to people from within.

00:28:21.430 --> 00:28:25.136
ATF in, like Chicago or Albuquerque or wherever.

00:28:25.136 --> 00:28:27.950
So I mean, at first they didn't know what to take of me.

00:28:27.950 --> 00:28:29.673
Like is pete an asshole?

00:28:29.673 --> 00:28:30.476
Is he a liar?

00:28:30.476 --> 00:28:31.928
Him and john like malcontents.

00:28:31.928 --> 00:28:33.053
So they didn't know.

00:28:33.053 --> 00:28:36.470
And then even within management, like some of the management wanted to cut my head off.

00:28:36.470 --> 00:28:43.955
But the nice thing was that there was somebody like the whole management team in phoenix got wiped out and I think this is important to bring up.

00:28:44.356 --> 00:28:48.152
So what happened was when they brought in a new management team it was around the same time I got subpoenaed.

00:28:48.152 --> 00:28:51.518
So so when I got subpoenaed, I had to notify my chain of command, the new chain of command.

00:28:51.518 --> 00:28:59.772
Hey, I got subpoenaed and the new head of the ATF office in Phoenix was a guy named Tom Brandon who had transferred in from Detroit again to right the ship.

00:28:59.772 --> 00:29:06.910
So imagine, you just crashed into the Titanic and they bring in some poor guy to hey, here's the steering wheel, now you take it from here.

00:29:06.910 --> 00:29:08.111
But Now you take it from here.

00:29:08.111 --> 00:29:13.575
But when I told him I got subpoenaed, tom literally reached into his pocket and he handed me a challenge coin.

00:29:13.575 --> 00:29:16.116
He was a very religious guy, catholic guy he handed me.

00:29:16.116 --> 00:29:18.117
So I'm Catholic but I'm not as religious.

00:29:18.117 --> 00:29:29.674
So when he handed me this challenge coin it was a St Michael challenge coin, which is the patron saint of cops and soldiers and whatnot and he said Pete, as long as you're telling the truth, I have your back.

00:29:29.674 --> 00:29:40.655
And for those four years where I was getting my head kicked in, tom I mean he couldn't really fight for me because he didn't see what I saw, but he, unlike a lot of other managers, gave me the latitude to fight for myself.

00:29:40.655 --> 00:29:57.588
And when I was in some particular battles with whether it was the deputy attorney general or the ATF director or certainly the US attorney himself presidentially appointed US attorney in Phoenix he gave me the room to fight my battles without telling me, hey, pipe down, or hey, you need to shut up.

00:29:57.588 --> 00:29:59.192
So I mean, you know, that's that.

00:29:59.292 --> 00:30:06.948
And I think once people saw, as Tom moved up in the organization, that Tom trusted me, then folks began to say, hey, maybe he's not such a bad guy.

00:30:06.948 --> 00:30:16.510
And then, as time went on and I got to actually talk to some of those folks, then they realized that, hey, I did this for the right reasons.

00:30:16.510 --> 00:30:17.817
I didn't do this because I was trying to make a name for myself.

00:30:17.817 --> 00:30:17.999
I didn't.

00:30:17.999 --> 00:30:18.480
I mean I wrote the book.

00:30:18.500 --> 00:30:21.571
Now that I'm retired I could have done some of these things way, way back in the day.

00:30:21.571 --> 00:30:25.989
I didn't think it was right because you know it just would rock the boat a little bit.

00:30:25.989 --> 00:30:30.676
But also I didn't think it would have been right that Brian Terry was his family.

00:30:30.676 --> 00:30:33.240
Never was told, even to this day, really, what happened.

00:30:33.240 --> 00:30:39.869
But I mean I felt like he just passed like to write a book and profit from that would have been in bad taste.

00:30:39.869 --> 00:30:48.016
But now, knowing what I know about how the Phoenix US Attorney's Office hasn't gotten any better and the lawyers there were never held accountable, I'm like you know what.

00:30:48.016 --> 00:30:49.150
It's time to tell the story.

00:30:56.924 --> 00:30:59.128
And that's why here, 10 years plus later, I decided to write the book.

00:30:59.148 --> 00:31:01.593
Yeah, did you ever want to give up during this process?

00:31:01.593 --> 00:31:03.596
You know, I I was a cop.

00:31:03.596 --> 00:31:09.833
I mean at heart, like not, and not when I say a cop I mean like a cop, like the same kid that walked the beat, like I.

00:31:09.833 --> 00:31:11.497
Just I love this profession.

00:31:11.497 --> 00:31:13.450
So did I want to give up?

00:31:13.450 --> 00:31:17.011
No, and I don't have another skill.

00:31:17.011 --> 00:31:20.655
I mean I studied carpentry for a while and I sucked at it.

00:31:20.655 --> 00:31:24.964
So I mean I don't know what else I would have did to make a living, but I truly love the profession.

00:31:25.306 --> 00:31:32.986
Going back 35 years in the profession four years of hell still didn't turn me against the profession or even ATF.

00:31:32.986 --> 00:31:43.210
I love ATF and a lot of positive change came out of the whistleblowing from within ATF Didn't really happen throughout the Department of Justice, where there could have been some reflection and some improvements.

00:31:43.210 --> 00:31:45.496
They just kind of circled the wagons.

00:31:45.496 --> 00:31:48.788
So I mean some positive changes did come out of it, I think.

00:31:48.788 --> 00:31:57.381
But yeah, I mean maybe I'm stupid, but I just never thought, hey, man, let me pack it in and go, because I don't know where I, where I would have gone, if that makes any sense.

00:31:57.885 --> 00:31:59.372
It makes complete sense to me.

00:31:59.372 --> 00:32:07.338
I mean, it's really difficult, I think to for one like you're talking about skills, right, this is your skill set, this is what you've done.

00:32:07.338 --> 00:32:08.105
This is what you know.

00:32:08.105 --> 00:32:08.847
This is what you've done.

00:32:08.847 --> 00:32:09.368
This is what you know.

00:32:09.368 --> 00:32:09.710
This is you know.

00:32:09.710 --> 00:32:20.096
And then to be like walk away from something you know that you loved, even though it's really hard to do something different, you know it, doesn't it?

00:32:20.096 --> 00:32:25.424
Probably being a carpenter, even if you were good at it, may not have been fulfilling like being a law enforcement officer, was.

00:32:26.406 --> 00:32:28.951
Oh and look, the reality is too, and we talked about this.

00:32:28.951 --> 00:32:37.656
You know, I look at what's going on in the world today, in the United States, where law enforcement has been demonized and there are certain people you know that want to defund and all that stuff.

00:32:37.656 --> 00:32:46.656
And you know people will take something that happens in a split second and analyze it for hours, weeks, months, years and then turn it around and demonize the cop.

00:32:46.656 --> 00:32:49.113
That's not the profession that I knew and loved.

00:32:49.113 --> 00:33:00.317
I mean, some of the finest people I worked with in my life were cops and then, like you know, I had a very good career and I was blessed.

00:33:00.317 --> 00:33:01.521
But I had a good career because I worked with good people.

00:33:01.521 --> 00:33:04.872
Like you know, none of the stuff that I accomplished that I accomplished on my own.

00:33:04.872 --> 00:33:05.914
I had good leaders.

00:33:05.914 --> 00:33:06.817
I had some bad ones.

00:33:06.817 --> 00:33:07.846
Again, we learned from both.

00:33:07.846 --> 00:33:09.550
I worked with some great cops.

00:33:09.550 --> 00:33:12.037
I worked with some lazy what's.

00:33:12.037 --> 00:33:14.049
You learn from them too.

00:33:14.585 --> 00:33:22.316
But the reality is, I think, when law enforcement is a noble profession, that's in a bad place right now and I think just I loved it.

00:33:22.605 --> 00:33:40.337
So I mean, that's why I'm still kind of like advocating for law enforcement in my retirement, because I just think it's important for us as a family, a law enforcement family, to stick together, and that's what made it hard for me to think about even leaving it at any point, whether it was back then because I was going to be forced out, or even when I retired back in 2021.

00:33:40.337 --> 00:33:49.646
It's a profession that I really think is just so vitally important, but I know that we also have a duty to try to get right.

00:33:49.646 --> 00:34:02.662
But the public, I think, has a duty to understand when we, when we mess up, if it's an honest mistake, and not demonize the person that makes the mistake, or to demonize an entire profession because of the acts of a few bad apples.

00:34:02.662 --> 00:34:07.686
You know, I mean, they don't do it to doctors, they don't do it to lawyers, and let me tell you, there are plenty of bad lawyers out there.

00:34:07.686 --> 00:34:10.130
So it's just to me, it's just, you know, I don't know.

00:34:10.130 --> 00:34:12.612
I look, I was blessed to be part of it for so long.

00:34:13.253 --> 00:34:16.717
Yeah, I think they do like to go after law enforcement.

00:34:16.717 --> 00:34:20.360
It's just they feel like it's a, it's an easy target right now.

00:34:20.360 --> 00:34:25.211
Yeah, unfortunately, you know just, uh, it's just bad, like it's just, and you know, not everybody's perfect.

00:34:25.211 --> 00:34:27.597
I think they expect these officers you know everybody's perfect.

00:34:27.597 --> 00:34:34.170
I think they expect these officers, you know, to make perfect decisions in fractions of of seconds.

00:34:34.170 --> 00:34:45.146
You know, and it's just like, yeah, mistakes happen and you know some of them are really bad mistakes and but right, just a few bad apples, you know people just could understand.

00:34:45.146 --> 00:34:49.855
The rest are really working really hard to to keep you safe and do the right thing.

00:34:49.855 --> 00:34:50.836
Sure.

00:34:51.117 --> 00:34:53.086
Well, I mean, look, here's the other thing too.

00:34:53.086 --> 00:34:56.414
Maintaining order isn't always pretty right.

00:34:56.414 --> 00:34:57.637
Necessary force, they call it.

00:34:57.637 --> 00:35:06.434
It's the minimal amount of force necessary On a body camera sometimes, that minimal amount of force, especially on somebody's cell phone camera which they get cleverly edited.

00:35:06.434 --> 00:35:16.280
But I mean, those things can be ugly, right and, as I'm saying, even when it's perfect, even when it's executed within the law and perfectly, it's not pretty.

00:35:16.722 --> 00:35:22.349
But these people who were demonizing the cops who use force when they have to to protect their life or the life of another, right.

00:35:22.349 --> 00:35:28.007
So now you have cops who are afraid to use force and the pendulum has swung where some cities have gotten a little bit out of control.

00:35:28.007 --> 00:35:42.177
What these politicians and others who advocate against cops forget is, at some point there's going to be a need to restore order, and restoring order is a lot more violent and a lot uglier than maintaining order.

00:35:42.177 --> 00:35:54.572
So I mean, I just wish that he would have thought things through before they started on this demonization thing, Because you know, look, I don't think cops go out there wanting to hurt anybody, right or they're one or two idiots?

00:35:54.733 --> 00:35:56.097
yeah, sure, um I.

00:35:56.097 --> 00:35:59.789
But look, and we, we know this because we were in this profession.

00:35:59.789 --> 00:36:12.152
Plenty of cops go home injured every day, you know, and sometimes injured because they went that extra mile to not hurt the suspect right, right, right so yeah, it's crazy agree, you know p.

00:36:12.172 --> 00:36:15.632
Before I let you go, let's talk just a little bit more briefly about your book.

00:36:15.632 --> 00:36:18.690
Like, what will people get from your book, the Fast?

00:36:18.690 --> 00:36:21.262
And we're talking about the Fast and Furious, Sure.

00:36:21.262 --> 00:36:22.025
Well, the book's called.

00:36:22.065 --> 00:36:26.976
The Deadly Path, how Operation Fast and Furious and Bad Lawyers Armed Mexican Cartels.

00:36:26.976 --> 00:36:37.534
And what they'll hear is the real story, because if you watched the news back then you either heard the Democrat version or the Republican version of events, because the news media was like now was a bit polarized.

00:36:37.534 --> 00:36:40.746
So the Democrat version was this started under George Bush.

00:36:40.746 --> 00:36:44.016
The Republican version was Barack Obama created this.

00:36:44.016 --> 00:36:47.146
You know, you'll see, this started in Phoenix.

00:36:47.407 --> 00:36:58.269
It was a boots on the ground thing that spun out of control because people abandoned the basic tenets of policing and leadership failed and prosecutors failed to do what prosecutors are supposed to do.

00:36:58.269 --> 00:37:03.829
So it's just the real, you know, unbiased story, firsthand account of what happened here.

00:37:03.829 --> 00:37:07.518
And look, there were things that rumbled around that I didn't see.

00:37:07.518 --> 00:37:21.157
I don't speculate, I only put in the book what I personally witnessed and saw, and you'll see the body count was growing in Mexico long before Fast and Furious even began because the prosecutors weren't doing their jobs.

00:37:21.157 --> 00:37:30.552
And then folks will see what happens when you speak truth to power and how the government doesn't exactly like to hear someone call their baby ugly, even when the baby's hideous.

00:37:31.434 --> 00:37:35.487
Yeah, oh yeah, right, I totally agree with that, Pete.

00:37:35.487 --> 00:37:39.331
Where can people find the book and see what you're doing with it?

00:37:39.931 --> 00:37:45.938
Sure, the book's available on Amazon and at all the major bookstores like Barnes, noble Books, a Million, whatnot.

00:37:45.938 --> 00:37:50.141
I have a website where if somebody wants to get a signed copy, it's easy.

00:37:50.141 --> 00:37:54.847
It's wwwpeterjforsellicom.

00:37:54.847 --> 00:37:55.809
But yeah, it's out there now.

00:37:55.809 --> 00:38:07.146
It's been on the shelves since March 5th and if folks decide to buy it, I'd be appreciative for the support and if they feel it's a good book.

00:38:07.146 --> 00:38:07.989
Word of mouth helps sell books.

00:38:07.989 --> 00:38:10.996
Man, when you're not Stephen King or James Patterson, you need all the help you can get.

00:38:15.764 --> 00:38:18.048
Yeah, man, when you're, when you're not stephen king or james patterson, you need all the help you can get.

00:38:18.048 --> 00:38:34.086
Yeah, as we were talking about this before we started recording, this is not an easy thing to do to to write a story like this, it takes a lot of work, a lot of time, extreme amount of dedication and a lot of financial backing right or of your own personal backing to do this.

00:38:34.909 --> 00:38:38.422
Oh, yeah, and you hope to break even, um, frankly, but yeah, it's, it's.

00:38:38.422 --> 00:38:41.170
It was something else and, look, I gotta give credit, I wrote it.

00:38:41.170 --> 00:39:01.760
It was originally twice as long as it is now and I brought in a young lady named Keelan McGregor they call her Kate McGregor to edit it and make it more manageable read, so it didn't read like a really, really really long police report and she did a great job as far as just making it, you know, more like a book that folks would rather read instead of this lengthy OIG report or something like that.

00:39:02.385 --> 00:39:04.152
So, I'm going to give her credit where it's due, you know.

00:39:04.733 --> 00:39:06.065
Yeah, totally Pete.

00:39:06.065 --> 00:39:07.490
Thank you so much for being on today.

00:39:07.490 --> 00:39:08.434
I really appreciate it.

00:39:09.065 --> 00:39:09.567
Honored to be here.

00:39:09.567 --> 00:39:10.369
Thank you so much for having me.

00:39:10.771 --> 00:39:11.293
Yeah, thank you.

00:39:11.293 --> 00:39:13.590
Thanks again for listening.

00:39:13.590 --> 00:39:18.492
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00:39:18.492 --> 00:39:33.896
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00:39:33.896 --> 00:39:45.615
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00:39:45.615 --> 00:39:55.440
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Peter Forcelli Profile Photo

Peter Forcelli

Retired ATF Deputy Assistant Director, Former NYPD Homicide Detective, and “Operation Fast & Furious" Scandal Whistleblower

Peter J. Forcelli is a retired ATF Deputy Assistant Director and former NYPD homicide detective. He worked his way up from "beat cop" to detective, before going on to serve as a Special Agent for the United States Department of Justice, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives. There, he rose through the ranks of ATF, eventually becoming a Deputy Assistant Director, where he served as senior ATF official in charge of operations for the Eastern U.S. before assuming command as the head of training for the agency. He has made over 1,000 arrests and has served over 300 search warrants in his career. He is perhaps best known for his work on numerous highly successful criminal cases, including the "Sex, Money, Murder" racketeering investigation, and the investigation into the Neese Bello Organization, which led to members of the group pleading guilty to over 145 home invasion style robberies. He was also a "whistleblower," who came forward and testified in the congressional inquiry into the "Operation Fast & Furious" scandal, following the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

Over the span of his career Mr. Forcelli served in leadership positions within ATF in Phoenix, Arizona; Eastern Canada; Miami, Florida and in ATF Headquarters. While serving as the Special Agent in Charge of the Miami Field Division, he oversaw ATF’s response to several mass shootings, including those at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, in Parkland Florida. He also oversaw A… Read More

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