Economic Crimes Expert to Give Hallock Lecture at CSU Alma Mater

September 15, 2011

COLUMBUS, Ga. — Columbus State alumnus Joe Parker, a 30-year federal law enforcement specialist, is the next speaker in the university’s Hallock Lecture Series.

Parker, recently an economic crimes advisor for the U.S. Treasury, will speak on "The Money Laundering-Terrorism Connection in Central America" at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, Sept. 27 in the Cunningham Center's Blanchard Hall.

Introduced by CSU in 2007 to address issues of national security,  the lecture named for the late Col. Richard R. Hallock is free and open to the public.

Parker, a 1992 political science graduate who later earned a Master of Public Administration from CSU, will share insight from his recently completed assignment for the U.S. Treasury in Mexico City, where he managed the Office of Technical Assistance’s execution of the Merida Initiative. The $465 million U.S. Department of State effort provides resources for long-term improvement of U.S.-partner security agencies in Mexico and Central America.

A Dallas native, Parker started his career in international banking before working for the FBI, U.S. Secret Service and U.S. Customs Service. With Customs, he served as representative to the General Secretariat of the International Criminal Police Organization in France, where he was assigned to the drugs subdivision as the cocaine desk officer. He assumed his most recent post in 2002 after earning his CSU degrees and teaching criminal justice as a doctoral teaching fellow at Sam Houston State University and at the University of Texas at Tyler.

Parker’s lecture is funded by the Richard R. Hallock Foundation and co-sponsored by the Department of Political Science and MPA Program.

Hallock was a much-decorated paratrooper in World War II, a personal aide for intelligence to Gen. Lucius D. Clay, who oversaw the post-war occupation of Berlin, and the youngest major to be a battalion commander in Korea.

 

For more information, call 706-507-8727.