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Wheeling Police Host FBI Teen Academy

photo by: Eric Ayres

Cpl. Joe Constable, left, demonstrates commands with K-9 officer Natty while fellow West Virginia Department of Corrections Special Operations Team member Cpl. Braden Wolfe is “apprehended” Tuesday outside Wheeling Police Department headquarters as part of the FBI Teen Academy.

WHEELING — High school students from schools throughout the tri-state region who are considering future careers in federal law enforcement got a unique opportunity to get first-hand, interactive lessons from Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and other officers on Tuesday.

The FBI Teen Academy in West Virginia holds sessions in different cities throughout the state each year, and on Tuesday, the academy was held for the first time in Wheeling. The day-long session took place at the Wheeling Police Department headquarters in Center Wheeling.

“The academy is a one-day program for juniors and seniors in high school to learn about careers in the FBI,” said Whitney Barnhart, community outreach specialist for the FBI’s state office in Charleston. “We have to share our story, and we haven’t done a great job recruiting students in West Virginia. We started Teen Academy four years ago, and we’ve done programs in Charleston, Huntington, Martinsburg and now Wheeling, as well as Beckley.”

Tuesday’s academy was not only the first time a session took place in Wheeling, it was also the first time all of the participating students happened to be girls.

“We have 10 young women that are with us today from seven different counties,” Barnhart said. “We have students from Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. We hope to showcase careers with the FBI, whether that’s a job as a special agent or professional staff opportunities so they can hopefully become the next workforce that we have of young people working for the FBI.”

The academy is open to all student applicants interested in a career in criminal justice or a related field. Barnhart said it was just a coincidence that all of the participants at this academy were young ladies.

“It’s a pretty big deal to see 10 young women here,” she said. “A lot of people look at law enforcement and think that it’s only for guys. I love to see young women sitting here today. This just happens to be the first program to have all girls — here in Wheeling.”

Students took part in several different activities throughout the day. Agents presented a PowerPoint presentation about the FBI’s investigation into the Hardy Carroll Lloyd case. Lloyd, of Follansbee, was convicted and sentenced in 2023 to serve 78 months in federal prison for attempting to intimidate and influence jurors and witnesses in the Pittsburgh Tree of Life synagogue shooting trial.

The group also got an opportunity to use the Wheeling Police Department’s “shoot or don’t shoot” FATS (Firearm Training Simulator) system, try on tactical gear, observe drone surveillance and K-9 demonstrations, learn how to extract digital evidence during an investigation and participate in other hands-on sessions.

“We’re hoping they’ll enjoy this opportunity,” Barnhart said. “It’s kind of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for them to go into a FATS machine, to meet with the ERT (Emergency Response Team) and the CART (Computer Analysis Response Team) members, the SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) team members — just to see the techniques and the tactics that we use daily to conduct FBI investigations.”

FBI Pittsburgh covers the state of West Virginia, with six resident agencies across the state. The Wheeling resident agency covers seven counties across the Northern Panhandle.

“We do have a resident agency here in Wheeling,” Barnhart said. “That’s why we wanted to bring Teen Academy to the Panhandle — to start encouraging outreach initiatives to showcase what the FBI does on a daily basis.”

“We want the students and their families who are going to be coming here this afternoon to meet the actual FBI agents that live and work here in this community. It’s our honor to serve the citizens and community of West Virginia, and we can’t do that without making those relationships. Today is about making relationships with the students, with their families and with the town of Wheeling.”

In order to work for the FBI, candidates must earn a four-year college degree.

“They’re at the age where they’re deciding whether or not they want to go to college, and if you want to work for federal law enforcement, you need that college degree,” Barnhart explained.

“So we hope to give them the roadmap for the next five years to decide what school they’re going to go to and to share that next step of our FBI Honors Internship Program, you can become an intern in any one of our 55 field offices or our headquarters in Quantico, D.C. That way they can start thinking long-term about going to college, becoming an intern and getting a job with the FBI.”

Barnhart said those participating in the Teen Academy are also urged to focus on making healthy decisions in high school and college, avoiding pitfalls such as drug use and other things that may come up in their background.

Members of the West Virginia Department of Corrections Special Operations Team conducted the K-9 and drone demonstrations and the FBI SWAT members provided static displays. Lt. Ashley White of the West Virginia Department of Corrections Special Ops Team helped coordinate Tuesday’s first FBI Teen Academy in Wheeling.

Barnhart said there were 52 students who participated in the Teen Academy in Charleston this past month, as well as 16 in Beckley. There are 23 students registered for the Teen Academy which takes place in Martinsburg in two weeks.

During the sessions, students get the opportunity to develop leadership skills and investigate the world of law enforcement through age-appropriate lessons on topics such as violence prevention, “sextortion” and hoax threats. FBI staff members and special agents, intelligence analysts and other professional law enforcement officers interact with the students with a focus on the work they do for a living, how they do it and why they chose this line of work.

Leah Hartline, a junior at Magnolia High School, said Tuesday’s event was a great opportunity to get first-hand knowledge of what an FBI agent truly does.

“I intend on going to West Virginia University or Fairmont State University to study forensics so hopefully I can end up with a job with the FBI — such as an evidence technician or an intelligence analyst,” Hartline said. “That’s my goal. We’re a very lucky group of girls. It’s great that we all get the chance to experience this and have a good representation of what our future could look like.”

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