The Vault Expert with J. Lawrence Cunningham

J. Lawrence Cunningham retired from the United States Secret Service after a diverse and accomplished career. Mr. Cunningham's 20-year career (1974 – 1994) encompassed supervisory experience in all aspects of Secret Service jurisdiction. As the Agent in Charge of the USSS Office located in San Jose, California, he coordinated and supervised the security arrangements for visiting dignitaries to include Pope John Paul II, Mikhail Gorbachev, Presidents of the United States, Presidential Candidates and other foreign Heads-of-State. His oversight of law enforcement personnel, motorcade routes, sites, and communications included the development and evaluation of crisis management and emergency contingency plans. Liaison duties included a seven-year membership on the Santa Clara County’s Law Enforcement Executive Council.

Other responsibilities included the development and prosecution of numerous domestic and international criminal cases involving complex telemarketing, credit card fraud, computer-hacking and high-tech fraud operations. His office developed precedent setting cases resulting in updated Federal Criminal Statutes. In these efforts, he streamlined the prosecution guidelines and procedures with the local District Attorney and the U. S. Attorney’s Offices.

Mr. Cunningham served on the Presidential Protective Division at the White House for five years and conducted international security advances for Presidential visits to Canada, China, France, Grenada and Germany, where his fluency in German was utilized. His other duties encompassed protective detail training and the supervision of the security agents assigned to conduct security advances.

During his assignment to the Secret Service Office of Training, Mr. Cunningham played a key role in the development of programs resulting in the implementation of new policies for the Secret Service. These efforts involved establishing new agent and in-service agent training curricula and the revision of the agent applicant hiring criteria.

Noteworthy among these included the development of specialized training programs for agents assigned to the White House Presidential Detail. In addition, following the assassination attempt of President Ronald Reagan, Mr. Cunningham consulted with Dr. Kenneth Cooper of the Cooper Institute for Aerobics Research in Dallas, Texas and developed the Secret Service mandatory fitness program. A major component of this included the implementation of a stress management curriculum for in-service training.

This innovative fitness program was established as policy and has subsequently been adopted by numerous federal law enforcement agencies to include the U.S. Army, U.S. Postal Service, U.S. Customs Service, U.S. Marshal Service and a number of police departments. He is affiliated with the Stanford Center for Research in Disease Prevention and has contributed to the development of a multi-factor risk reduction program for public safety officers.

In 1994, he developed the dignitary security plan for the Stanford World Cup Soccer Venue on behalf of Stanford University. His duties encompassed the coordination of emergency training exercises interfacing Bay Area law enforcement entities with Department of Defense officials. He administered post orders, managed and evaluated over 350 security personnel for this event.