>> Why don't you all talk a little bit
about how you chose law enforcement
and maybe specifically I know
we have two actual law enforcement ladies,
and then an attorney who is now our AD of policy.
So a little different probably path to law enforcement.
Why don't you talk about that a little bit?
>> So for me once upon a time
I thought I wanted to be a chemical engineer
and at some point in college
I kind of changed paths and realized
I wanted to go into Federal Law Enforcement
that, that was the better fit for me
because I've always been very inquisitive.
I've always been a very analytical person
and I wanted a career that I felt would make a difference.
And I feel that law enforcement,
particularly Federal Law Enforcement
is the perfect combination of all of those skills.
In my career a lot of my investigations have been
in the child exploitation arena
and I believe within HSI,
ERO, and ICE everything we do is important,
but that particular arena I feel just really makes an impact
because we are saving the lives of children
and protecting children.
So it's just the perfect fit for me.
Sometimes you think back and you think what if?
What if? But I don't really think that.
I believe that I ended up where I was supposed to be, so.
>> Mine was a little bit of a different path.
I didn't really have a goal to be in law enforcement,
or certainly the military when I pursued college.
In fact I was very set.
I was pre-med for the first two years
and had wanted to be an obstetrician
and then botany and chemistry got in the way in college.
It's like; this is not really my thing.
One of the gifts again going back to my mom
and my grandmother is my mother insisting
on continuing to speak French with me.
As we came back to the United States
I would continue to answer in English,
but her shortcoming in English was my strength to learn French.
So it kind of opened up that side of the brain
on learning language
and then of course knowing French I was able
to pick up a couple of other languages fairly easily
and so in college
I went to that
just because it was my comfort zone
with Spanish and business
and I grew up in a rather structured environment.
My dad is a retired colonel from the military.
I lived on five continents, I went to numerous schools
so the sense of finality after I graduated
from college, I couldn't take it.
It was like okay you're done, boom. Go find a job.
And so much to the horror of my parents-not horror necessarily
but here they had paid all this money for me to go to college
and then I decide to go to the recruiter
and because it just felt right I joined the military.
And I joined the Army and I became a Russian linguist,
again just kind of going down that path
of interest in language.
And I was in the intelligence community
which I absolutely loved.
That was something that I didn’t know was in me,
but to be the analyst and it was very enjoyable.
So coming from that structure, coming out of the military
I had a window there where I was actually
going to go back to school to become a midwife
'cause that was still just in my goals
but life calls,
I had children at the time
and I became an analyst for then INS
and just through
I don't know, the good graces or just leadership at the time back
when we had district directors
I was very blessed in that they saw potential in me
with my languages
suggesting why don't you become law enforcement?
And so that's what I did.
So I became a deportation officer in 1998, loved it,
and just saw that the language skills came to play
and very blessed too with mentors
and just to fall into what came natural to me,
and that was taking care of people.
I absolutely love leadership,
and so that was my path to be very honest.
I really never saw that coming,
but so blessed and fortunate excuse me,
to have become the field office director
for the Seattle field office in 2010.
So you just never know where your path takes you.
>> Exactly.
>> And here I am now in a much different role,
but it's just sometimes you don't know
if you try to be too rigid
on what you think you're supposed to do,
or what other people want you to do your true
calling may be overshadowed by that.
So that's a take away when we talk to--I have two daughters
so talking to my daughters,
or talking to the young women who are in our academy
currently it's just if this is your calling, right?
Just settle into it
and the rest kind of takes care of itself, right?
>> Exactly. >> It's just, yep.
>> Yeah, totally agree.
>> So for me I've always been interested in law and justice.
That was always very exciting, and in law school
I focused a lot on crime pro
and other criminal clinical classes
and was a student prosecutor.
I think that as Nathalie just mentioned,
the jobs that were available to me
in sort of stumbling upon the Federal Government position
I was able to then specialize in the administrative law
realm
having previously been
with the Government Information Law Division in OPLA.
What has really been fortunate for me
in terms of ending up in law enforcement agencies
prior to ICE I was with DEA,
is my admiration for law enforcement officers.
That stems partly from my mother, right?
Just being in awe of the strength,
and courage it takes for someone to be in that position,
to protect the public
and to put other people’s safety first before theirs.
And so I also feel that I'm very fortunate
that although I'm in a supportive role
within management and administration
that I’m service this greater purpose
and I'm supporting law enforcement officers
in the mission of the law enforcement agency.