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Anslinger transferred from Venezuela to the Bahamas before being appointed commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. Enforcing Prohibition and deterring smugglers on the islands would inform his long career in federal drug law enforcement.
Anslinger worked in the Army Ordinance Department throughout World War I--experience that prepared him for a diplomatic career immediately following the conflict. A brief assignment in Germany first exposed him to the international narcotics problem.
On November 4, 2019, Jorge R. DelRio, a Dayton, Ohio, police officer and a 19-year Drug Enforcement Administration task force officer, along with other members of the DEA Dayton Resident Office were executing a federal narcotics search warrant at a residence in Dayton. During the search, Task Force Officer DelRio was shot twice and eventually succumbed to his injuries on November 7, 2019. Read more >
On August 6, 2015, Washington State Patrol Detective and Drug Enforcement Administration Task Force Officer Brent L. Hanger was participating in a joint WSP and DEA marijuana eradication effort on public lands outside of Yakima, Washington. This operation was conducted as part of the Seattle, Washington Field Division’s Domestic Cannabis Eradication and Suppression Program. TFO Hanger was hiking with other members of the Reconnaissance and Arrest Team following a tip about a suspected large-scale outdoor grow operation when he suffered chest pains, which required immediate medical attention. Attempts by on-scene medical personnel to revive TFO Hanger proved unsuccessful, and he was pronounced dead on the scene. Read more >
Mary P. Sullivan, a clerk-typist at DEA's Miami Regional Office, died on August 5, 1974, as a result of the collapse of the office building. She was 56 years of age at the time of her death. Read more >
Federal Bureau of Narcotics Agent Mansel Ross Burrell was killed by drug traffickers on December 19, 1967, in Gary, Indiana, while working undercover on a heroin investigation. He was 23 years of age at the time of his death. Agent Burrell was the youngest federal narcotics agent ever to die in the line of duty. Read more >
On December 12, 1957, Narcotics Agent Wilson M. Shee of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Federal Bureau of Narcotics, was killed in San Francisco, California, by a drug-addicted informant. He was 36 years of age at the time of his death. Read more >
Agent Anker M. Bangs, Chief of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics for Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, was killed by an opium addict during an undercover operation on September 24, 1950. After supervising similar raids in Iowa and Nebraska, investigative information led him to an opium den in the Glendale Apartment Hotel in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he was killed. He was 50 years of age at the time of his death. Read more >
Agent Andrew P. Sanderson of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Federal Bureau of Narcotics in Denver, Colorado, was killed on September 23, 1944, when a tire blowout caused his official government vehicle to overturn. He was 53 years of age at the time of his death. Read more >
Narcotics Inspector Spencer Stafford of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Federal Bureau of Narcotics, was 36 years of age when he was shot and killed on February 7, 1935, in Post, Texas. Inspector Stafford was fatally wounded when Sheriff W.F. Cato fired at him with a machine gun as he exited a veterinary hospital. Charged with the murder were the sheriff; his deputy, Tom Morgan; and two local doctors, L.W. Kitchen, a veterinarian, and V.A. Hartman, a physician. In addition, both doctors were charged with federal narcotics violations. Read more >
