50 Fun Facts About FBI

In what year was the Bureau of Investigation, forerunner of the FBI, created?

The attorney general hired 34 people with Justice Department expense funds after Congress barred him from borrowing Secret Service men.

Which attorney general organized the Bureau of Investigation in 1908?

He was a grandson of Napoleon's brother Jérôme and his American wife Elizabeth Patterson.

Which president pushed to create an investigative service answering only to the attorney general?

McKinley's 1901 assassination had stoked fears of anarchists, and the Oregon land fraud scandal exposed how short-staffed Justice was.

Who was the Bureau's first 'chief', the title now called director?

Bonaparte only notified Congress of the new agency in December 1908, months after it began work.

The Bureau's first official task was surveying brothels to prepare to enforce which 1910 law?

It was better known as the White Slave Traffic Act.

In what year did the agency officially take the name Federal Bureau of Investigation?

It had briefly been the United States Bureau of Investigation and then the Division of Investigation, linked to the Bureau of Prohibition.

For how many years did J. Edgar Hoover run the Bureau, from 1924 until his death in 1972?

He was appointed by Calvin Coolidge and outlasted eight presidents; Nixon was recorded in 1971 explaining why he dared not fire him.

After Hoover's death, Congress limited future FBI directors to how long in office?

Since 1968 directors have also needed Senate confirmation, a rule that did not apply to Hoover as the incumbent.

Which president appointed J. Edgar Hoover to lead the Bureau in 1924?

Herbert Hoover was no relation; J. Edgar was a Washington, D.C. native.

What was J. Edgar Hoover's first job, taken at age 18?

The library was half a mile from his home, and biographers say its cataloguing culture shaped the FBI's obsession with files.

On what date in 1895 was J. Edgar Hoover born?

He was born on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., where a stained-glass window in a Methodist church is now dedicated to him.

In what year did the FBI's Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory officially open?

Hoover created it to professionalize investigations; the lab now handles most of the Bureau's DNA and physical evidence work.

Outside which Chicago movie house was John Dillinger shot dead by Bureau agents in July 1934?

Brothel owner Ana Cumpănaș, later mythologized as the 'Woman in Red', had tipped off authorities.

Which agent, key to getting Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd, later served with Patton in WWII?

Ness worked for the Prohibition Bureau, not the FBI; Hamer was a Texas Ranger who ambushed Bonnie and Clyde.

Which gangster was NOT among those the FBI lists as caught or killed in the 1930s 'War on Crime'?

Capone was brought down for tax evasion by Treasury agents; the Bureau's roll call also includes Alvin 'Creepy' Karpis.

Which 1927 Supreme Court case ruled wiretaps of a bootlegger did not breach the Fourth Amendment?

Katz overturned it in 1967, after which Congress required warrants for wiretaps under the Omnibus Crime Control Act.

Early Bureau homicide investigations included the murders of members of which Native American nation?

The 1920s oil-wealth killings in Oklahoma were later dramatized in Killers of the Flower Moon.

Under which Supreme Court case were six of eight captured Nazi saboteurs executed during World War II?

The FBI arrested all eight; the case is still cited in debates over military tribunals.

The joint US-UK Venona Project, in which the FBI was heavily involved, broke the codes of which country?

Hoover ran the FBI's side of it but did not tell the CIA about the project until 1952.

Which wartime policy did Hoover oppose that Roosevelt then enacted under Executive Order 9066?

The FBI had already detained more than 5,500 Issei men from its custodial list within weeks of Pearl Harbor.

What did the name COINTELPRO stand for?

Its targets included the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Martin Luther King Jr.

COINTELPRO was exposed after activists burgled an FBI office in March 1971 in which Pennsylvania town?

The Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI mailed the stolen files to newspapers including The Harvard Crimson.

Which FBI deputy director was Watergate's 'Deep Throat'?

He fed the Washington Post while his boss was on sick leave, resigned in 1973 under suspicion, and only confirmed it in 2005.

In what year did the FBI officially announce its Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list?

It grew out of a chat between Hoover and an International News Service editor about publicizing the Bureau's 'toughest guys'; robber Thomas J. Holden was the first name.

Machetero member Víctor Manuel Gerena spent how long on the Ten Most Wanted list, longer than anyone else?

He was added in 1984. The FBI insists the list is unranked: nobody is officially 'number one'.

Leslie Isben Rogge, who surrendered in 1996, was the first Most Wanted fugitive caught thanks to what?

He turned himself in at the US embassy in Guatemala City after being recognized online.

The FBI Academy, where new agents complete a 21-week course, is located in which Virginia town?

It opened in 1972 on 385 acres of woodland and lent its name to a 2015 TV series.

How many field offices does the FBI maintain in major US cities?

They are backed by more than 400 resident agencies in smaller cities; each field office's senior officer also represents the director of national intelligence.

What are the FBI's overseas offices in US embassies and consulates called?

There are about 60 LEGAT offices plus 15 sub-offices, mainly for coordinating with foreign security services.

The elite Hostage Rescue Team was formed in 1982 ahead of which event?

The 1972 Munich massacre was the lesson; unlike local FBI SWAT teams, HRT does no investigating.

The FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division, home to the fingerprint database, is where?

The Clarksburg complex, opened in 1995, is the length of three football fields.

Which brand of pistol has been the FBI's standard issue since 1997?

Agents get a full-size 22 or compact 23 in .40 S&W; the Hostage Rescue Team carries a Springfield 1911 in .45.

FBI agent Robert Hanssen was arrested in 2001 after leaving classified material at a dead drop where in Virginia?

He had been selling secrets to Moscow since 1979 for money alone, and got life in prison in what the DOJ called possibly the worst intelligence disaster in US history.

In what year did the FBI first learn Robert Hanssen had begun selling intelligence?

He offered his services to the Soviet GRU that year; the CIA's Aldrich Ames was a second mole working at the same time.

Boston mob boss Whitey Bulger, an FBI informant since 1975, was finally captured in 2011 in which city?

He had been on the Ten Most Wanted list for sixteen years, second in notoriety only to Osama bin Laden.

Which Irish-American crime group did Whitey Bulger lead?

The FBI's Boston office was accused of turning a blind eye to his crimes in exchange for information on the Italian Mafia.

The Unabomber, arrested in 1996, had lived since 1971 in a remote cabin in which state?

Ted Kaczynski's brother recognized his writing style after the newspapers published the 35,000-word manifesto.

The 1992 Ruby Ridge standoff between the FBI and Randy Weaver took place in which state?

Justice Department reviews later found FBI agents had obstructed investigations into both Ruby Ridge and Waco.

How long did the 1993 Waco siege last after the failed ATF raid?

Four ATF agents and six Branch Davidians died in the initial raid before the FBI took over.

The FBI was criticized for its treatment of which guard after the 1996 Olympic Park bombing?

Jewell had actually spotted the bomb and cleared the area; the Bureau later settled a dispute with him.

Which FBI director, appointed just before 9/11, served from 2001 to 2013?

He was a decorated Marine officer in Vietnam and later led the special counsel investigation into Russian election interference.

Which FBI director was fired by the president in May 2017?

He was the seventh director, having served since 2013.

The 1997 film Donnie Brasco tells the true story of which undercover FBI agent infiltrating the Mafia?

Johnny Depp played him opposite Al Pacino; Pistone spent six years inside the Bonanno family.

The TV series Criminal Minds follows which part of the FBI?

The unit was originally called the Behavioral Science Unit and belongs to the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime.

The FBI's national security work is most often compared to which British agency?

Unlike the CIA, which has no law-enforcement powers and works abroad, the FBI is primarily domestic.

Roughly what was the FBI's total budget in fiscal year 2019?

Almost all of it goes to salaries and expenses; only about $52 million of the 2021 request was for construction.

How many people did the attorney general hire to staff the new Bureau in 1908?

Some were Secret Service veterans; Congress had feared the new agency would become a secret police force.

Which president dedicated the J. Edgar Hoover Building, the FBI's headquarters, in 1975?

Personnel had begun moving in the previous October; the building sits at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW.

Which FBI agent was killed on 9/11 while helping evacuate the South Tower of the World Trade Center?

He stayed to help rescue personnel and was inside when the tower collapsed.

The FBI's Uniform Crime Reports compile data from roughly how many law enforcement agencies?

They track arrests, clearances and officer information, focusing on the volume of serious crimes nationwide.