ROWLEY, Coleen

Coleen Rowley is a former FBI agent and attorney who became a prominent whistleblower following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Serving as chief legal counsel for the FBI's Minneapolis field office, Rowley had firsthand knowledge of the bureau's handling of intelligence related to Zacarias Moussaoui, who was later identified as the "20th hijacker" in the 9/11 plot.

In the weeks before September 11, 2001, the Minneapolis FBI office arrested Moussaoui on immigration charges after he aroused suspicion at a flight training school by requesting to learn how to fly commercial aircraft but showing no interest in takeoffs or landings. Field agents sought a warrant to search his computer and belongings, believing he might be planning an attack involving aircraft.

FBI headquarters repeatedly denied the Minneapolis office's requests for a warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), despite the field agents' concerns about Moussaoui's connections to terrorist organizations. Headquarters officials argued that the evidence did not meet the legal threshold for surveillance of a U.S. person, even though Moussaoui was not a U.S. citizen.

Following the September 11 attacks, Rowley discovered that information that could have supported the warrant application had been available to other parts of the FBI but was not shared with the Minneapolis office. This revelation led her to write a 13-page memo to FBI Director Robert Mueller in May 2002, detailing the systemic failures and bureaucratic obstacles that prevented effective investigation of the Moussaoui case.

Rowley's memo criticized the FBI's culture of risk aversion, poor information sharing between field offices and headquarters, and the career incentives that discouraged agents from pursuing aggressive investigations. Her detailed account provided crucial insight into the intelligence failures that preceded the September 11 attacks.

In recognition of her courage in exposing these institutional problems, Time magazine named Rowley one of its three Persons of the Year for 2002, alongside fellow whistleblowers Sherron Watkins of Enron and Cynthia Cooper of WorldCom. Rowley's actions contributed to significant reforms in FBI procedures and intelligence sharing protocols designed to prevent similar failures in the future.