By Steve Neavling
FBI Director Christopher Wray appointed two agents to serve as executive assistant directors of separate branches.
Robert Brown was named executive assistant director of the Science and Technology Branch. He had been serving as assistant director of the Operations Technology Division.
Larissa L. Knapp was named executive assistant director of the National Security Branch, where she will oversee all national security investigative and intelligence operations. Knapp had been serving as executive assistant director of the Human Resources Branch.
Knapp began working for the FBI in 1997 as a special agent in the New York Field Office. Since then, she has held several leadership positions, including deputy assistant director of the Intelligence Operations Branch in the Directorate of Intelligence in 2017, special agent in charge of the Counterterrorism Division in 2018 and assistant director of the Security Division in 2020.
Knapp received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Union College in New York and a juris doctor from Hamline University in Minnesota.
Brown joined the bureau in 2002 and was assigned to the Miami Field Office, where he investigated organized crime.
In 2011, Brown led the Raleigh Resident Agency of the Charlotte Field Office in North Carolina. In 2014, he served as assistant special director in charge of the Columbia Field Office in South Carolina. In 2016, he was promoted to section chief in the Criminal Investigative Division at headquarters in 2016.
A year later, Brown was named deputy assistant director for the Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate, and in 2018, he became special agent in charge of the Louisville Field Office in Kentucky.
Brown graduated from The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina. In addition, he received a master’s degree in public administration from Norwich University.
He served as a deputy sheriff for nine year before joining the bureau.
