Episode 44: John Fabbricatore

John is a retired member of the Senior Executive Service and former Field Office Director (FOD) for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Enforcement Removal Operations (ERO). The jurisdiction John oversaw includes Colorado and Wyoming, covering 200,000 square miles and more than 200 federal employees.

John began his career of service by joining the United States Air Force. During his 4 years in the Air Force, John served as a Security Police and Security Forces member.

John began his civilian federal career in 1996 with the Federal Protective Service (FPS) as a police officer for the General Services Administration (GSA), where he was assigned to the New York Terrorist Trials Operations Command in New York City. In 1997, FPS sent him to Denver, Colorado, to work on both Oklahoma City Bombing trials. Two years later, he became an officer for the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in Denver.

In 2003, John was selected as an instructor for the newly formed U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE), Enforcement Removal Operations (ERO) Academy at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, where he taught in the Physical Techniques Division and the ERO Fugitive Operations Academy.

In 2005, John was promoted to Supervisory Officer for the ICE Denver Field Office. There, he helped establish the Criminal Alien Program and numerous fugitive task forces. He was promoted in 2011 to Assistant Field Office Director (AFOD), where he presided over Criminal Prosecutions and Fugitive Operations. He later served as the AFOD over Field Operations, Emergency Management, and Intelligence. During this time, John attended the United States Marshals Service Training Academy and completed the Fugitive Investigator Course.

John greatly impacted the State of Colorado, as he served as the Denver Field Office, Deputy Field Office Director from 2017 to 2020, when he was then promoted to Field Office Director. During this tenure, John was detailed for six months to the DHS Joint Task Force West in San Antonio, Texas, where he served as Deputy Chief of Staff.

John oversaw the initial rollout of Operation Opioid Counterstrike, a multi-agency, cross-corridor operation at the federal, state, local, tribal, and international level to disrupt Transnational Criminal Organizations' trafficking in opioids. In 2021, he was detailed to Washington, DC, to work in the DHS Operations section as the Director of Independent Departure for the Afghanistan Refugee crisis, Task Force Operation Allied Welcome. In 2023 he received the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Silver Medal for Meritorious Service Award. He was also awarded the Meritorious Life Saving Medal from Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office for saving a life in a fire.

John retired from ICE on July 31, 2022 and now resides in Aurora, CO. He is happily married to Eileen and has two beautiful children, Olivia and Symon. They also have two rescue pups named Thor and Layla. In John’s free time, he trains in Brazilian Jiu jitsu, provides self-defense training to the local communities, and enjoys hunting on his property in Craig, CO.