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This is a first in a series of articles identifying and examining “The Careers of the 21st Century." 

Career leap: Latina FBI agents tell their stories
By Kemila Velan

My father, a retired New York Police Department sergeant, once told me, “Law enforcement is not for females.” He had his reasons, being caught in the chaos of 1960s civil rights and daily drug wars in New York City, but little Latinas nowadays have every right to dream of a career in law enforcement.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, whose primary mission is to protect and defend the U.S. against terrorist and foreign intelligence threats, is practically courting Latinas. They are a coveted demographic for their bilingual skills and vast undercover possibilities. The following profiles describe two Puertorriqueñas’ ascent to the high rank of FBI Special Agents.

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Julia Flores, 27, never considered becoming an FBI agent until the opportunity fell in her lap a year ago when she was working for Mayor Carlos Méndez Martínez of Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, as a special aid in economic development. She was singing the national anthem at the inauguration of an FBI program to keep kids drug-free, when the mayor told the attending agents, “If you guys want to recruit anyone, this is the girl I would recommend.”

“So I figured I’d do it,” said Flores, who has a bachelor of science in biology and a master’s in genetics from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez.

As she passed exam after exam and ran every day with one agent and his wife, she realized her skills would eventually secure her place as one of 10 women in a class of 52 at the academy in Quantico, Va. The course work was rigorous, “like doing a master’s degree in four months,” but that’s what it takes, Flores said, to jump straight into the action right after graduation.

“I went on a search warrant the second day I got out,” she said.

From civil rights to counterterrorism to white-collar crime, Flores has switched departments and can continue to do so throughout her career and never get bored. It’s the perfect job for someone with a short attention span, she said.

The biggest drawback is the distance from her mother, a retired teacher, and father, a Southern Baptist minister. They still live in Puerto Rico, but visit her often in San Antonio. A close second is the reactions she gets from her dates.

“Initially they think it’s really cool and they’re impressed, but sometimes they find me intimidating,” she said. “A lot of woman agents end up marrying another agent.”

For now, she doesn’t mind trading a more traditional life for financial security and excitement. She is already making $60,000 in her first year and stands to receive generous raises annually. Before she has a family, Flores hopes to do some undercover work.

“When you’re Latina, that’s the last thing people expect an FBI agent to be,” she said. “Maybe it’s a fantasy, but I'm interested in that. I’m an adrenaline junkie, so I would want to be in the violent crime reactive unit.”

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Eileen Villa, 34, has been an FBI agent for nine years and says the scarcity of Spanish speakers in her office in Indianapolis is the key to indispensability and a career that pays her more than $100,000 a year.

“I never would have thought at my age I would hit that kind of salary,” said the mother of a 22-month-old boy and a three-month-old girl. Although Villa works 10-hour days in white-collar crime, the schedule is stable and she is able to split parenting duties with her husband, a U.S. Marshal, and her mother. “Some people think you can’t be a mom if you’re in law enforcement because of the risk. But I’m living my dream.”

At the same time Villa pulls no punches with the young Latinas she meets at career fairs. An agent should be flexible and expect to be transferred to any of the bureau’s 56 offices around the country, which isn’t always easy if you have a family.

But with the FBI’s formula for retirement at 50 years old with 20 years of service, Villa will have more time to spend with her family by the time her son is 18. “It’s a very comfortable life, I can’t complain.”

Before motherhood, Villa’s life was a whirlwind of traveling and “catching the bad guys.” She worked for three years in the Caribbean with the evidence response team, and she searched through the scrap of the World Trade Center for dead bodies after the Sept. 11 attacks.

It was a heart-wrenching experience, but “when you found a part of a body, you thought, ‘This was somebody,’ and you could at least bring some closure to the family,” she said. “That was very rewarding.”

They were the kinds of experiences the psychology and criminal justice minor dreamed of while studying at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville.

“I’ve worked white collar, violent crimes, kidnappings, drugs – I’ve been able to dabble in a little bit of everything, so there’s never been a dull moment.”

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The names of these agents have been changed to protect their anonymity. The FBI requires a complete background investigation, drug test and polygraph before acceptance into the 18-week training at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va. Applicants must have at least a bachelor’s degree and three years’ work experience. To start the process, visit https://www.fbijobs.gov.

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Kemila Velan, a Miami-based Puertorriqueña, is a regular contributor to TheLatinaVoz.com and is president of BiscayneWriters.com.