Coast Guard Commissions New Maritime Law Enforcement Academy U. S. Coast Guard December 01, 2004 CHARLESTON, S.C. - The Coast Guard is commissioning its new Maritime Law Enforcement (MLE) Academy located at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) Charleston today designed to harden the nation's maritime homeland security through improved training. Following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, increasing homeland security requirements placed a greater demand on the Coast Guard's law enforcement capabilities requiring an expansion of its training program. Working with its fellow Department of Homeland Security agency, FLETC, the Coast Guard began planning to establish the MLE Academy. Today marks the culmination of an 18-month reogranization effort that combined the Coast Guard's two previous training programs, the Martitime Law Enforcement School in Yorktown, Va., and the Boarding Team Member School in Petaluma, Calif., into one single facility co-located with FLETC Charleston. This move will standardize training, leverage the powerful resources of FLETC and the other agencies it trains, and increase the Coast Guard's training capacity. The new Charleston installation incorporates more modern simulation activities into the law enforcement training curriculum and ultimately toughens our nation's maritime security. "This move will allow us to share techniques, theories and procedures with experts from a wide range of law enforcement capabilities," said Vice Adm. Terry Cross, Vice Commandant of the Coast Guard. "This will enhance our training programs and give our people more tools as they keep America safe and secure." The Coast Guard began its first courses at the MLE Academy on Nov. 1. In a typical year, the school will train and graduate 768 boarding officers and 1080 boarding team members. In addition, each year 128 state marine resource officers will attend its marine patrol officer course, which facilitates the sharing of expertise and resources between federal, state and local enforcement officers. The Coast Guard is America's lead federal maritime law enforcement agency and has broad, multi-faceted jurisdictional authority in maritime security, boating safety, drug interdiction, living marine resources, alien migrant interdiction and in responding to vessel incidents involving violent acts or other criminal activity. As a snapshot of the Coast Guard's law enforcement efforts the following statistics for the last year are provided: - Conducted more than 50,000 law enforcement and security boardings. - Enforced 103 security zones. - Served as the lead maritime law enforcement agency for 5 National Security Special Events (Superbowl, G-8 Summit, Pres. Reagan's funeral, DNC and RNC). - Seized a record-setting 242,000 pounds of cocaine and 25,000 pounds of marijuana and arrested 326 suspected smugglers. - Interdicted 10,899 illegal migrants, the most since 1994.

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