Gregory Ford took the job as director of the Army Criminal Investigation Division in September 2021, just four months after the service decided to move command of the criminal investigative agency from a general officer to a civilian. He will leave the post on Aug. 23, 2025. (Naval Criminal Investigative Service)
The first civilian director of the Army Criminal Investigation Division will retire next month after stepping in nearly four years ago to reform an organization plagued by lack of efficient staffing, training and equipment.
Gregory Ford took the job in September 2021, just four months after the Army decided to move command of the criminal investigative agency from a general officer to a civilian — a format already in place with the Navy and Air Force investigative organizations.
“Director Ford is retiring from Army CID after 25 years of law enforcement service and has accepted a position in the private sector following his retirement,” said Marc Martin, spokesman for the division.
His retirement will begin Aug. 23, Martin said. CID does not yet have an interim or permanent replacement ready to be announced.
“[Ford’s] civilian leadership transformed CID into a modern and effective investigative body, actively addressing the most pressing challenges within the Army,” said Cynthia O. Smith, Army spokeswoman.
Ford came to the job following 16 years at the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, where he last served as deputy director of operations. His focus was to increase the number of civilian agents at CID to 60% of the workforce and improve on many deficits found by the Fort Hood Independent Review Committee in 2020.
The Army formed the committee after the disappearance and death of Spc. Vanessa Guillen from Fort Hood on April 22, 2020. Another soldier in Guillen’s unit is believed to have killed her with a hammer, then moved her body. Her remains were found off post more than two months later and questions arose during the search about the conditions of the base and division.
The committee’s report described the workforce of the base’s CID office as “unstable, under-experienced, over-assigned and under-resourced.” Those issues led to “inefficiencies that had an adverse impact on investigations, especially complex cases involving sex crimes and soldier deaths.”
Ford said last year that the reforms were a daily effort for the agency.
“We’re continuing every day working a very challenging mission, while in the midst of that, transforming the organization. It does not come without challenges by any means,” he said.
