Diversion Investigator (DI) is a master position in the Office of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Special Agent (SA) is a position in the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The employees of these agencies are trained, supervised, clearly authorized to carry out large and small criminal cases and perform the arrest of powers. The paper aims to determine the responsibilities of these two positions, the effect of ambiguity, credibility, and critical thinking on the performance of these roles.
Duties
Diversion Investigators (DI) deal with the leakage of controlled pharmaceuticals and chemicals from the official channels in which they are produced, distributed, apportioned. DI’s mission is to help US pharmaceutical and chemical companies comply with the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) and other relevant laws (the United States Drug Enforcement Administration). DIs conduct expert examinations to identify and investigate suspicious referral sources and take appropriate criminal and authoritative actions.
A Special Agent (SA) must adhere to the most unusual behaviors, especially in maintaining authenticity and integrity. SA should work at least 50 hours a week, which can include unpredictable hours, and be in touch 24 hours a day, counting days and weekends (Federal Bureau of Investigation Jobs). Besides, they should maintain well-being to respond effectively to life-threatening circumstances at work. Most importantly, they should be prepared and take part in the capture, execution of inspection orders, and other unsafe tasks.
Vagueness, Ambiguity, and Generalities
DI should be able to collect data from several sources and analyze this information. Therefore, the generalization method is critical. For example, by researching various drugs of different origins, the generality is sufficient for sorting data. Several drugs with similar pharmacological effects can be investigated separately, which is an effective method for saving time. On the contrary, the SA should concretize the purpose since the capture of the offender requires the identification of features in most cases rather than the generalization. If a particular agent is involved in a matter of robbing a specific group, it is necessary to predict the next region of the attack by narrowing the data. Therefore, generality causes different efficiency levels in the SA and DI’s jobs.
Ambiguity and vagueness reduce the performance of both DI and SA. The ability to research, identify significant factors, and interpret the provisions, rules, and laws in the work of DI are associated with accuracy. However, the data’s uncertainty requires double-checking the data, which takes more time, attention, and samples that require more consumption. Likewise, in SA’s work, ambiguity and vagueness can turn out to be catastrophic, especially in murder cases, as it can lead to new victims.
Credibility
SA should keep their policies and prejudices away from their daily behavior and workflow. For instance, when it comes to serial killings, giving false information to show the law enforcement agency in the best possible light will have negative consequences when real data is discovered. The actions of agents can undermine public confidence in the country’s leading law enforcement agency, and thus, credibility is necessary for the operation of SA.
Although secret sources can be critical to an investigation, extreme care must be taken to evaluate and manage their use carefully. Numerous variables can promote private sources: counting fear, getting money, avoiding discipline, competition, and excuses. The widely publicized witness cases used by both the FBI and DEA have gone astray, emphasizing the need for exceptional care and guidance in managing such confidential sources. For example, the DEA’s operator’s manual requires professionals to provide prosecutors with detectable data related to any secret source that could be used as a witness. This data includes partial payments to the single-origin, any verbal or composite statements, and the impeachment information known to the DEA that will affect the reliability. Therefore, the validity of the source must be adjusted to reflect the data they provide.
Critical Thinking
The essential skill in the work of special agents is critical thinking since the use of logic and reasoning helps to identify a conclusion or approach to solving problems. The most common way to use critical thinking is to make a portrait of a killer. Individual agents are primarily involved in dangerous killers, and determining their character, motive, psychological state, addiction, age, gender will help narrow the search. Sometimes, the concept of murder can be caused by mental attraction, the definition of which depends on the agent’s critical thinking.
Analytical skills are more critical for DI than critical thinking, although this skill cannot be ruled out. One of the qualifications of DI is the ability to evaluate information and develop solutions. Working closely with chemical firms to set more specific standards and transparency requires careful analysis. The work usually involves auditing and field audits in different parts of the country. In other words, the employee becomes a detective, accountant, and chemist partly; this is an area of a career that requires painstaking attention to detail and thorough research. For example, an audit is processed in the largest hospitals, and a study requires the time, quantity, purpose, and sale of drugs in this hospital. Therefore, such a large amount of information requires analytical rather than critical qualities.
References
Federal Bureau of Investigation Jobs. Special agents: The face of America. Web.
United States Drug Enforcement Administration. Diversion investigator careers, Web.