I am pleased that the Senate Judiciary Committee has approved S. 1235, my bill to provide railroad police officers the opportunity to attend the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Academy for law enforcement training in Quantico, Virginia. I thank Senators Hatch, Biden, DeWine, Schumer, Helms, and Grams for their co-sponsorship of this legislation.

The FBI is currently authorized to offer the superior training available at the FBI’s National Academy only to law enforcement personnel employed by state or local units of government. Police officers employed by railroads are not allowed to attend this Academy despite the fact that they work closely in numerous cases with Federal law enforcement agencies as well as State and local law enforcement. Providing railroad police with the opportunity to obtain the training offered at Quantico would improve inter-agency cooperation and prepare them to deal with the ever increasing sophistication of criminals who conduct their illegal acts either using the railroad or directed at the railroad or its passengers.

Railroad police officers, unlike any other private police department, are commissioned under State law to enforce the laws of that State and any other State in which the railroad owns property. As a result of this broad law enforcement authority, railroad police officers are actively involved in numerous investigations and cases with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.

For example, Amtrak has a police officer assigned to the New York City Joint Task Force on Terrorism, which is made up of 140 members from such disparate agencies as the FBI, the U.S. Marshals Service, the U.S. Secret Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. This task force investigates domestic and foreign terrorist groups and responds to actual terrorist incidents in the Metropolitan New York area.

Whenever a railroad derailment or accident occurs, often railroad police are among the first on the scene. For example, when a 12-car Amtrak train derailed in Arizona in October 1995, railroad police joined the FBI at the site of the incident to determine whether the incident was the result of an intentional criminal act of sabotage.

Amtrak police officers have also assisted FBI agents in the investigation and interdiction of illegal drugs and weapons trafficking on transportation systems in the District of Columbia and elsewhere. In addition, using the railways is a popular means for illegal immigrants to gain entry to the United States. According to recent congressional testimony, in 1998 alone, 33,715 illegal aliens were found hiding on board Union Pacific railroad trains and subject to arrest by railroad police.

With thousands of passengers traveling on our railways each year, making sure that railroad police officers have available to them the highest level of training is in the national interest. The officers that protect railroad passengers deserve the same opportunity to receive training at Quantico that their counterparts employed by State and local governments enjoy. Railroad police officers who attend the FBI National Academy in Quantico for training would be required to pay their own room, board and transportation.

This legislation is supported by the FBI, the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the National Railroad Passenger Corporation.

I urge prompt Senate consideration of this legislation to provide railroad police officers with the opportunity to receive training from the FBI that would increase the safety of the American people.