Cindy Chang is an ATF special agent/certified fire investigator (SA/CFI), whose perseverance and risk-taking led her to remarkable achievements in the male-dominated field of law enforcement. She made history as the first female Asian American SA/CFI and member of ATF’s National Response Team (NRT).
Chang grew up in the 1980s as the only daughter of a Chinese immigrant father and a Russian-Polish mother just outside of Pittsburgh. Her father, a nuclear engineer, always pushed her to excel and often gave her difficult math problems to help build her analytical skills. Little did she know these early lessons would set the foundation for future successes.
In 1995, she enrolled as a psychology major at Wellesley College, right outside of Boston. During this time, she researched careers in fire science and made the connection between her degree and one of ATF’s main missions: fire and arson investigation. To build her experience, Chang took on challenging internships at a local medium-security state prison, the Bureau of Prisons in Washington, D.C., and the Criminal Profiling/Behavioral Analysis Unit at the FBI’s National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime.
After graduation, Chang began a Master of Science in Forensic Science degree at the University of New Haven’s campus in Sacramento, California. At this point, she realized she needed more than higher education to compete with other candidates who had prior police or military experience. She pushed hard to join ATF’s student programs and served as an intern at the ATF Sacramento Field Office while attending grad school. Chang’s strategy paid off — she was hired as an ATF special agent in 2001. Thirteen years later, she applied for a CFI opening and was accepted into the intense, two-year training program. The program required her to investigate at least 100 fires, all while completing graduate-level classes and carrying out her special agent responsibilities. Of note, Chang joined the International Response Team during her CFI program while also serving part-time on the NRT.
Chang graduated from the CFI program in 2016 and deployed on multiple arson and explosives investigations. She investigated a rash of 10 San Francisco Bay Area construction site fires that took place from 2016 to 2019 within a small, densely populated residential area. She also investigated the deadly 2016 Ghost Ship warehouse fire that killed 36 people. In 2020, Chang worked on the interagency task force responding to the riots in Portland, Oregon. This team of law enforcement partners worked to identify suspects who used incendiary and/or explosive devices during the civil unrest incidents that rocked the city. In complex cases like these, Chang reviews hundreds of leads, identifies and traces various types of evidence and conducts numerous witness interviews.
Throughout her education and career, Chang forged new and unique pathways to success, achieving many career milestones. Her innovative journey in forensics and law enforcement became a history-making career that allowed her to follow her passion and truly contribute to ATF’s mission to enhance public safety.
