Alejandro Vargas
Lieutenant, LAPD (ret.), Criminology and Criminal Justice
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Bio
Alejandro (Alex) Vargas, Jr. is a Scholar-in-Residence for the College for Health, Community and Policy and a lecturer in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Texas at San Antonio. A practitioner-scholar and retired lieutenant with 28 years of service in the Los Angeles Police Department, his extensive experience includes patrol and uniform crime suppression operations, homicide, sexual assault, stalking, mental health, workplace and school violence, and criminal enterprises involving gangs, narcotics, and transnational organized crime. With approximately 20 years in counterterrorism, he served in the LAPD Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Section, the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, and as Deputy Director of the Joint Regional Intelligence Center, overseeing intelligence and critical infrastructure protection efforts, and completed a Police Executive Fellowship at the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division in Washington, D.C. He holds a Bachelor of Science from California State University, a Master of Arts in Security Studies/Homeland Security and Defense from the Naval Postgraduate School, and a Doctorate in Policy, Planning, and Development from the University of Southern California. Currently contracting with the U.S. State Department’s Anti-Terrorism Assistance Program, his academic and professional interests focus on applying a public health approach to violence prevention and mitigation, integrating evidence-based strategies to address crime, enhance resilience, and improve community safety.
