Captain Brad Williams is a career State Law Enforcement Officer with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, holding the rank of Captain. He is currently assigned as FWC’s Statewide Mutual Aid Operations Chief which includes the supervision of Regional Special Operations Response, the Disaster Response and RECON program, Air Deployable SAR program, Maritime Preventative Radiation Nuclear Detection Program, and Florida’s Multi-Agency Waterborne Response Teams. His responsibilities include Disaster, Tactical, and Domestic Security planning and response, Inter-agency Command and Control, and coordination of FWC’s mutual aid operations in all venues. He comes to his current mission from a 2 year assignment as the Statewide Special Operations Coordinator. Prior to entering the Special Operations community, Captain Williams served an 8 year assignment as an Area Commander in the Western panhandle of the state, responsible for all state marine and wilderness law enforcement operations.
During large scale and multi-team responses, he is designated as the Forward Incident Commander for all 6 FWC Special Operations Group (SOG) teams. The teams, stationed throughout the state, are specially armed, equipped, and trained to handle emergency and high risk responses to natural and manmade disasters, terrorist threats or attack, domestic security/dignitary protection missions, and civil disturbances. The teams provide specialized law enforcement in marine and wilderness environments where tradition law enforcement agencies do not go.
He has been a state law enforcement officer with the Florida Marine Patrol (FMP) and now the Fish and Wildlife Commission (FWC) for more than 28 years and was a state law enforcement officer with the State of Mississippi’s Marine Enforcement Division for 3 ˝ years prior to joining the Patrol.
He has a Bachelor of Science Degree (BS) from the University of Southern Mississippi in Marine Geology and Marine Biology, and a Master of Public Administration Degree (MPA) from the University of West Florida.
While with the FMP/FWC, Captain Williams has been assigned to Apalachicola, Key West, and the Florida Panhandle, and seen special duty throughout the rest of the state. In addition to his current duties, he has been assigned as a Patrol Officer, Field Training Officer, Large Offshore Patrol Boat Master (Patrol Vessel “ORION”), Field Supervisor, and Field Office Commander. He has been involved in all aspects of the agency’s operations including Patrol, Search and Rescue, Boating Accident Investigation, Narcotics Interdiction, Under Cover Narcotics Operations, Environmental Enforcement, Wildlife and Fisheries Enforcement and Emergency Operations Command during disasters and domestic security threats.
He has been a guest instructor and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers (FLETC) in Glenco, Georgia and Artesia, New Mexico, and at the FWC Academy in Quincy, Florida. He is a private consultant in marine law enforcement, anti-terrorism, and maritime security and Director of Operations for Marine Tactical Applications Global, LLC, a maritime security company offering consulting and training throughout the world. He also provides training in marine law enforcement tactics to state and local law enforcement agencies and Federal, U.S. Military, and Department of Defense personnel, throughout Florida. He was recently named the 2005/2006 Honorary Commander for the USAF 16th Special Operations Group at Hurlburt AFB. He has also served as a panelist at the National Security Forum through the United States Air War College at Maxwell AFB. He is a certified Lead Instructor for the National Association of State Boating Law Administrators (NASBLA) Boat Operations and Training (BOAT) program. In May of 2010 he was awarded the Florida Governor’s 2010 First Responder Award for his work to improve emergency disaster response capabilities in Florida and across the nation.
Captain Williams is also active in the community having been a volunteer fire fighter for almost 34 years. He currently serves as Deputy Chief of the Florosa Volunteer Fire Department and is a member of NASCAR’s Talladega Superspeedway Pit Fire Safety Team. He is married with two children and resides in Mary Esther, FL. He is active in the Navarre United Methodist Church as a trustee and a musician in the contemporary Christian music band, “Celebration”.