DS Special Agent Wins 2006 Federal Law Enforcement Training Center's Honor Graduate of the Year Award

FLETC Deputy Director Ken Keene [left], DS Special Agent Shane Dixon with his award [center], and DS Assistant Director for Training Mark Hunter [right], Feb. 22, 2008. PHOTO COURTESY OF FLETC.

Diplomatic Security Special Agent Shane Dixon, a native of Mt. Juliet, TN, won the 2006 Federal Law Enforcement Training Center’s (FLETC) Honor Graduate of the Year Award. He was the top graduate among 3,944 federal agents from eligible FLETC Basic Programs.

Special Agent Dixon earned this prestigious Honor award with a 98.10% academic average compiled from multiple written examinations.

Special Agent Dixon’s award marks the first time in FLETC history that the Honor Award recipient has come from the same federal agency two years in a row - the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service. The 2005 Honor Award winner was Diplomatic Security (DS) Special Agent Victoria Anzaldua.

Federal law enforcement agents from the Diplomatic Security Service, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the U.S. Marshals Service and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service are but a few of the more than 80 federal agencies whose trainees attend FLETC courses annually and are eligible for this award.

FLETC conducts training for 60,000 federal, local, tribal, and international law enforcement officials annually.

Dixon is a 1992 graduate of Mt. Juliet High School. Upon graduation, he entered the United States Marine Corps and served for four years. Dixon returned to Tennessee and became a deputy sheriff with the Wilson County Sheriff’s Department. After one year, Dixon enrolled at Tennessee Technological University and graduated in 2000 with a Bachelor of Science in Sociology and an AAS in Criminal Justice.

Upon graduation, Dixon began working for the Regional Organized Crime Information Center (ROCIC), a non-profit organization funded by the U. S. Department of Justice, as a Senior Intelligence Specialist. In 2004, Dixon became a federal agent for the Department of Energy (DOE). He worked at DOE until the spring of 2006. In May of 2006, Dixon entered the Department of State’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security’s training to become a DSS special agent. He was a member of training class Basic Special Agent Course (BSAC) 91. After graduation, he was posted to his current assignment, Diplomatic Security’s Los Angeles Field Office.

"As the law enforcement and security arm of the Department of State, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security (DS) has special agents assigned in 159 foreign countries and 25 U.S. cities. The basic criminal investigator training provided by FLETC provides our agents with the foundation for their careers starting with investigating visa and passport fraud, domestic and overseas protection, and managing embassy security programs overseas," said Acting Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, Gregory B. Starr. "FLETC and DS have a long and fruitful history of more than 20 years of working together. We are not the largest agency in terms of the number of students who pass through FLETC, but in terms of quality, our students rank among the very top. That is, in large part, a testimony to the fine, quality training FLETC provides."

More information about the U.S. Department of State and the Bureau of Diplomatic Security may be obtained at www.state.gov/m/ds.