Richard Lambert

Senior Counterintelligence Officer

Richard LambertRichard “Rick” Lambert was named Senior Counterintelligence Officer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in March 2012.  In this capacity, he is responsible for management of the Oak Ridge Field Office of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Counterintelligence Program.

Mr. Lambert joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1988, serving as a Special Agent in the St. Louis Division, where he was an investigator for the Violent Crimes/Major Offenders Program and the White Collar Crime Program. He was promoted in 1992 to Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) in the Civil Litigation Unit and Employment Law Unit of the Legal Counsel Division at FBI Headquarters (HQ) in Washington, D.C.

In 1995, Mr. Lambert was appointed SSA in the Office of Professional Responsibility, the FBI’s Internal Affairs component. A year later, he was appointed SSA in the Norfolk Field Office. During his tenure supervising an organized crime/drug squad, the squad dismantled a local chapter of the Renegades, a national outlaw motorcycle gang and the chief importer of methamphetamine into the Tidewater area of Virginia. Under Mr. Lambert’s leadership, the squad also dismantled an international Jamaican drug trafficking enterprise.

Mr. Lambert was named an Assistant Inspector/Team Leader in the Inspection Division at FBI HQ in 1999 and was subsequently named Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the San Diego Field Office, where he was responsible for management of the FBI’s Foreign Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism Programs, including oversight of the Joint Terrorism Task Force and coordination of the Field Office’s investigation of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. In September 2002, Mr. Lambert was appointed Inspector in the Inspection Division at FBI HQ and was detailed to the Washington Field Office to oversee the FBI’s investigation into the anthrax bioterrorism attacks that occurred in fall 2001.

From June 2006 until his retirement from the FBI in March 2012, Mr. Lambert served as special agent in charge of the Bureau’s Knoxville Field Office, with oversight for nearly 150 federal employees distributed throughout East Tennessee.

Mr. Lambert received a bachelor’s degree in English in 1981 and a master’s degree in political science in 1982, both from Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls. He then received a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree in 1986 and a Master of Public Administration degree in 1987, both from the University of Houston, and a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Tennessee. He is a member of the Texas Bar.