June 30, 2008

I’m just back from Washington DC where I spent several days visiting the headquarters of the Secret Service while researching an article for Parade magazine entitled, “Protecting the President in the 21st century. I don’t know when my interest in the Secret Service started, but it was long before the movie, “In the Line of Fire.” For some reason, I’ve always found this elite organization fascinating. The Secret Service doesn’t just safeguard the President of the United States, (as well as several dozen other important personages), they are also charged with protecting the nation’s financial institutions, and that means they are the lead agency fighting counterfeiting and electronic cybercrimes.

My interest grew during the course of researching my novel, The Devil's Banker. At the time, I interviewed James Sloan, director of FinCEN, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. Prior to coming to FinCEN, Jim had spent twenty years as a Secret Service agent. He showed me photos of him driving the Pope-mobile in the late 80’s and told me a little about his time heading up Barbara Bush’s protective detail. A few months later, I met Jim’s younger brother, Tom, who was also recently retired from the Service. Both these guys were sharp as tacks, and I started thinking that maybe I ought to learn some more about this little known agency.

(As a footnote, Jim Sloan is currently Director of Intelligence at the Coast Guard and Tom, is running international security for the New York Stock Exchange.)

Anyway, my time in DC was interesting, to say the least. Director Mark Sullivan really opened up the doors for me and I was able to get an inside out view of how the Service does what they do.

The highlight, though, was my trip to the Rowley Training Center the following day. We made a stop at the presidential protective driving school and one of the instructors thought he might have a little fun showing me what it takes to drive the President. I climbed aboard the Dodge Charger – Police Edition and strapped myself in. I was ready for a wild ride…but not this wild. When I stepped out ten minutes later, my head was spinning, but luckily, my stomach was none the worse for the wear. If you’ve never executed a J-turn going 50 miles an hour in reverse, you haven’t lived!

That’s it for now.

By the way, the new book hits the stands in two weeks. I’ll be in New York to start things off with an appearance on the Glenn Beck Show, Monday, July 14th.

More to come…