Aug. 7) -- His title may be "acting," but there's no pretending that things haven't been outright wild, abuzz, atwitter, downright explosive since George Venizelos took over in March on a temporary basis as head of the New York FBI office, the largest in the country.
There was the high-anxiety Times Square car bombing case. The Russian spy case. Key indictments of mobsters. And the roundup of 78 gang members from the Latin Kings and Bloods. And that's just to name a few. In fact, since March, his agents have had a hand in the indictment of about 330 people.
"It all happened at once. It was definitely the experience of my life. It happened so fast," he told AOL News. "Acting can be a thankless job, but acting in New York is still a tremendous responsibility."
Matthew Coleman, FBI
FBI Acting Assistant Director in Charge George Venizelos at a gang takedown in Newburgh, N.Y. on May 13. Next week, he relinquishes his position as head of the FBI's New York office.
Monday, Venizelos loses the "acting" title and returns to his old role as special agent in charge of administration for the New York FBI Office. The permanent boss is arriving: Janice Fedarcyk, a friend of his who's been running the Philadelphia FBI Office.
"For me personally it was exciting," Venizelos, 50, said. "It seemed like every week something was happening. This was just kind of the perfect storm."
That he more than just weathered the storm earned him high marks among peers.
"George Venizelos ... has been a ready and capable leader of the FBI's New York Field Division, demonstrated never better than in the last five months as he oversaw some of the nation's most significant security cases," said U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara of the Manhattan office.
Venizelos grew up in Edgewater, N.J., just on the other side of the Hudson River, overlooking New York City.
He became an agent in 1991, bouncing around before he was named assistant special agent in charge of the Criminal Division in New York in 2002. A year later, he was assistant special agent in charge of the office's Counterterrorism Division, and in 2006, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III named him special agent in charge of administration in New York.
Then earlier this year, his boss, Joseph Demarest, the assistant director in charge of the office, got into some hot water.
The Justice Department's internal affairs began looking into allegations that Demarest may not have been fully truthful about an affair with a subordinate in the office. Demarest, who was highly thought of by the FBI director, went to headquarters in the interim. He was eventually assigned there permanently to the post of assistant director in charge of the International Operations Division.
On March 1, Venizelos became the office's leading man. And it was an action-packed role.
On May 1, someone planted a car bomb in Times Square. It didn't go off, but it triggered a frenzy and sent the FBI, New York police and other law enforcement agencies on a mad dash to find the culprit.


"It happened so fast," Venizelos said. " And there was a lot of pressure at the time. One, we didn't know who was responsible, or whether there was going to be other attempts in the works. There was a lot of pressure to identify this person."
Long days and nights followed.
"You don't want to sleep," he said. "You really want to solve this. You're not going to be able to rest till this gets solved."
Things moved at a rapid pace. The car was being analyzed. The origin of the explosive materials and the ownership of the car itself were being traced. Agents and police were pounding the streets, interviewing people. Tips were being followed up domestically and internationally.
And then there were the factors beyond his control -- like the media reporting developments in the case.
"Things were getting out so quick," he said. "You had to work at lightning speed. The bad guys are watching TV."
Finally, around 11:45 p.m., 53 hours after spotting the car bomb, suspect Faisal Shahzad was pulled off a Dubai-bound jet at JFK Airport, and agents and New York police detectives began interrogating him.
"I knew we would solve it," Venizelos said. However, he added, "I was a little disappointed we weren't ahead of this," explaining that ideally it would have been good to have known about it beforehand.
"There was tremendous work done," he said. "This is classic the way the JTTF [Joint Terrorism Task Force] should work. Everyone came together and worked quickly and efficiently." He said FBI headquarters, agents overseas, the New York police department -- everyone "did a tremendous job."
The FBI and New York police got plenty accolades for the quick capture. But with the gushing praise came some criticism in the media; agents had lost track of Shahzad while surveilling him. Some critics said the agency had screwed up.
Some in law enforcement defended the lapse, saying it wasn't uncommon to lose a tail on someone while trying to stay close -- but not too close as to get spotted.
"In surveillance, it's the nature of our business," Venizelos said. "It's always going to happen from time to time. We learn from these situations. A 30-second lapse can lose surveillance at the drop of a dime."
Then on May 13, 10 days after capturing the car bomber, the acting director helped supervise the roundup of dozens of Bloods and Latin King gang members in Newburgh, about 50 miles north of New York City. About 500 federal, state and local cops were involved.
Shortly after the roundup, he had to rush over to White Plains, N.Y., for a press conference, all the while he was getting updates on his BlackBerry on raids the FBI was conducting in different cities, trying to link other folks to the Times Square car bomber.
"That's the beauty of New York," Venizelos said. "Whether it's a spy case or something else, there's always something going on."
Besides the actual cases, there were other potential challenges, like dealing with the strong-willed and bigger-than-life New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.
The former director, Demarest, had a strong enough personality to deal with Kelly. It would be a real test for the interim guy.
The good thing, Venizelos said, was that he'd been around New York long enough and dealt with the Police Department for many years.
So he said people in the Police Department had his back; they made certain things went smoothly.
"The commissioner himself went out of the way to make me feel welcome and dealt directly during the Times Square case," Venizelos said. "He treated me with the utmost respect."
Kelly could not be reached comment.
Venizelos said his own "troops rallied around me to make this a good experience. To see this office come together and go out of its way to make me look good was heartening. I really enjoyed it. Even the headaches I liked."
That said, it makes sense when he remarks that he "would have loved" to have gotten the job on a permanent basis. But he figured it wasn't in the cards since the agency preferred candidates who had run their own FBI offices.
"I showed interest, of course. But I never expected it."
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