With over twenty-five (25) years of law enforcement experience, Edwin L. Santana retired from the Morris County Sheriff’s Office Bureau of Corrections in July 2021 and was rehired in February 2022 to oversee the Morris County Sheriff’s Gang Intelligence Unit. In his current role, he identifies and monitors national, state, and county activities that may be affiliated with criminal street and prison gangs, as well as extremist, radical, and hate organizations. Throughout his career as an instructor, Santana has trained approximately 59,000 civilian and law enforcement professionals across the United States and abroad. In both 2011 and 2023, he was a guest speaker at the National Alliance of Gang Investigator Associations’ World Gang Summit. Santana has interviewed and assisted as a gang specialist for

Santana graduated from the Passaic County Police Academy and was certified by the State of New Jersey as a Method of Instruction (MOI) instructor in 2001. Since 2008, he has had the honor of instructing recruits in the Police Training Commission (PTC) Basic Police Class & Basic Correctional Classes at the Morris County Public Safety Training Academy. Over the span of his law enforcement career, Santana has been assigned to the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office (MCPO) Task Force and detailed to their Fugitive Unit, Narcotics Unit, and Crime Intelligence Task Force Unit. During these assignments, he assisted in county- and statewide operational intelligence gathering, undercover surveillance, and tactical arrests related to gangs, guns, and narcotics. From 2020 to 2021, Santana served in an undercover capacity for the Warren County Prosecutor’s Office on a multimillion-dollar racketeering/insurance fraud scheme, dubbed “Operation Vacant Lot.” He has also been called to testify as an Expert Gang Witness at both the state and federal levels. In 2019, Santana was recognized by United States Chief District Judge Frank D. Whitney of the Western District of North Carolina as an Expert Gang Witness regarding the “United Blood Nation” and “9-Trey Gangster Blood” gang history, culture, and ideologies. Santana currently serves as the Co-Founding Executive Board Member (2022–present) of the Correctional Gang Information & Intelligence Sharing Network (CGSIIN), establishing a forum for correctional gang investigators to share information on a national level. He has previously held positions within other gang investigative organizations, including Vice President (2010–2013) of the International Latino Gangs Investigators Association (ILGIA), overseeing chapters in the United States, Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Spain. In 2006, he became a co-founding Executive Board Member of the New Jersey Gang Investigators Association (NJGIA), eventually serving as its Vice President of Training (2013–2015). From 2018 to 2021, Santana was the New Jersey Chapter President for the East Coast Gang Investigator Association, where he oversaw both law enforcement and civilian gang training throughout the state. Today, Santana continues providing individualized training, expert gang opinions, and testimony under both the Morris County Sheriff’s Office banner and his own G-STEP (Gang Suppression Through Educational Programming), LLC.

various news and media outlets, including Fox News’ “Geraldo Rivera at Large,” the Biography Channel’s “Gangsters: America’s Most Evil,” the History Channel’s “Gangland,” and most recently, the international Complex Magazine and Spotify investigative podcast series “Infamous: The Tekashi 6ix9ine Story.”