Janeen DiGuiseppi Named Special Agent in Charge of Albany Field Office
Will She Run It “the FBI Albany Way”?
It is an office that has been plagued by constant changes in leadership in recent years – and an office that was recently chided by US District Court Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis for its neglect in investigating and prosecuting Keith Raniere who romped in its backyard for 20 years.
The FBI Albany office received numerous complaints against Raniere and NXIVM/ESP over the years – from Joe O’Hara to Kristin Keeffe to Barbara Bouchey and others – and they never charged him with a crime. And though they were provided with numerous details and documents, it’s not even certain that they ever undertook any investigation of either Raniere or NXIVM/ESP.
Raniere’s supporters say that the FBI’s NYC office did a foul deed and created crimes where none existed when they undertook an investigation of Raniere and NXIVM/ESP. And according to these same supporters, the proof is that the Albany FBI, whose responsibility it was to investigate potential criminal deeds done on their turf, never did so – not through incompetence or indifference but because there was never any evidence.
The FBI’s NYC office, operating under someone’s strings, be it the Illuminati or other foul and perfervid interests, wanted Raniere out of the way – and so they did whatever it took to get the job done. At least, that’s what some of Raniere’s supporters say.
Raniere has told some supporters that the Illuminati was out to get him – and maybe they finally did.
Now the FBI Albany field office will have yet another leader – Janeen Di Guiseppi – the seventh in seven years.
The FBI Albany field office – which is part of the US DOJ for the Northern District of New York covers 32 Upstate, mostly rural NY counties – and includes the state’s Capital Region and the entire state of Vermont.
Curiously – and it is perhaps a species of cover-for-you-own – when prosecutors in the Eastern District of NY announced the indictments and convictions of the NXIVM defendants they gave shout-outs to the US DOJ of the Northern District of NY and the Albany field office of the FBI for their help.
They got thanks from the prosecutors at the EDNY – but not from EDNY Judge Garaufis, who said he did not understand why the NDNY did nothing about Raniere for years. Such public rebukes of the FBI are a rarity – but, at least in this case, seemingly well-deserved.
Meantime, just days after Garuafis’ chiding, FBI Director Christopher Wray named Janeen DiGuiseppi as special agent in charge of the Albany Field Office.
Prior to her most recent appointment, DiGuiseppi was deputy assistant director of the FBI’s Training Division. She joined the FBI as a special agent in 1999 and was first assigned to the Salt Lake City Field Office, where she worked violent crime, drug, and public corruption violations.
In 2008, DiGuiseppi was promoted to assistant legal attaché in Baghdad and supervised the FBI’s Major Crimes Task Force. She returned to Salt Lake City in 2009 and was assigned to the DEA’s Drug Diversion Task Force until she was promoted to supervisory special agent in 2010 as the FBI’s biometric lead in Kabul, Afghanistan.
She was assigned to the Memphis Field Office in Tennessee in 2012, where she supervised the civil rights and public corruption programs and the Violent Crimes Against Children/Child Exploitation Task Force.
In 2014, she was promoted to assistant section chief of the Public Corruption and Civil Rights Section in the Criminal Investigative Division at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. She later served as chief of staff to the division’s assistant director. In 2016, she was named assistant section chief of the Transnational Organized Crime – Eastern Hemisphere Section, where she managed domestic and international programs focused on organized crime and major theft.
DiGuiseppi was named assistant special agent in charge in the Denver Field Office in 2017, with oversight of the intelligence and surveillance programs, the Rocky Mountain Regional Computer Forensic Laboratory, and the Wyoming resident agencies.
In 2019, Ms. DiGuiseppi was selected as section chief of the FBI Training Division’s Curriculum Management Section, and promoted to deputy assistant director in 2020.
She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Central Florida, a master’s degree from Western New England College, and a master’s degree from Florida International University. Prior to joining the Bureau, DiGuiseppi served as an officer in the United States Air Force.
Revolving Door of FBI Special Agents in Charge (SACs)
The FBI’s Albany field office has had seven different SACs since 2013 – almost one per year.
Andrew Vale about 4 years [2013-2017]
Vadim Thomas about a year. [2017-2018]
Acting SAC Janelle Miller served four months in 2018
James Hendricks served from November 2018 to May 2020
Thomas Relford served from May 2020 to May 2021 – lasting a whole year
After Relford left, Albay was overseen from DC
DiGuiseppi was named last month
One of the previous SACs, James N. Hendricks, was the subject of an internal investigation regarding a claim that he sexually harassed eight subordinate employees, and failed to report an intimate relationship with another subordinate, according to a U.S. Justice Department investigation. Hendricks was appointed head of the Albany field office in July 2018, after serving as a section chief for a Weapons of Mass Destruction unit at FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Following the end of his intimate relationship with his co-worker in Albany, the report stated, Hendricks allegedly “engaged in actions… that created a hostile work environment for the subordinate – and “lacked candor” during the SAC’s interview with the OIG, all in violation of FBI policy [Editor’s note: The term “lacked candor” is the DOJ’s way of saying “That FBI agent lied his ass off to us when we questioned him”].
Did James Hendricks really abuse women or did he try to get order and regulations in place at FBI Albany? (Photo John Carl D’Annibale Times Union)
By the way, if you are not in the FBI and you lie to an FBI agent, you can be charged with a felony for lying – and go to prison for five years. However, if you are an FBI agent, you can lie with impunity. It is described as “a lack of candor.”
As far as we know, Hendricks was not proven guilty of anything He seems to have broken up with his subordinate FBI agent-lover and made things hard on her afterward, it was alleged.
Others complained too. Which makes it seem like he was guilty. But Hendricks was a newcomer to Albany – and the new boss too – which means he was placed above other agents who were there longer than him.
The other agents probably knew each other and this Hendricks dude comes in, takes over as boss, starts an affair with one of their co-workers and, in the end, breaks up with her. So, maybe it’s possible that she and the others have ganged up on him and ousted him.
Hendricks quit the FBI and tried to do it quietly but the Times Union outed him. [Ironically he was not named in the FBI report].
In the end, Hendricks may have just been another kinky Albany-based leader but, unlike Raniere, he was not arrested.
Those six or seven agents who complained about Hendricks at FBI Albany probably had a lot of opportunities to arrest Raniere over the years but for some reason never did.
Since Hendricks did not come to Albany until after Raniere was arrested, it’s not fair to lay the blame on him for turning a blind eye to the Vanguard’s criminal operations at NXIVM/ESP if anyone – other than Garaufis – are inclined to do so.
Judge Garuafis thinks Raniere should have been prosecuted long ago in the NDNY – and is amazed that it never happened.
This notion that Hendricks might have been a victim of being ganged up on got support from one commenter who wrote: “There is a lot more to this story. Hendricks was railroaded because he wanted to make FBI Albany follow the rules. There is the FBI way and there is the FBI Albany way. Too many loyalists to [former SAC] Andrew Vale hidden in the office. They were not gonna let the previous Special Agent in Charge’s image be tarnished by Hendricks exposing the FBI Albany way.”
Vale was the SAC who might have done something about Raniere – since he was in charge when many of the complaints were made and when DOS was created and destroyed by the Frank Report and whistleblowers.
Seven in 7 Years?
That seems like a pretty high rate of turnover. There may be quite a bit of internal conflicts and subordinates may be in charge of FBI Albany – insisting that they do things “the FBI Albany way”.
Up until now, “the Albany FBI way” has meant that only six members of the NXIVM/ESP criminal enterprise have been held accountable for their numerous misdeeds.
We’ll see if that changes now that Di Guiseppi is in charge.
Thomas Relford retired in May 2021
Upon his departure, he noted: “My work has taken me all over the world, but I truly believe I was meant to spend this last year serving the amazing people of the Capital Region, Central New York, Upstate New York, the Southern Tier, and Vermont”.
