[FEDCOM] DEA Confusion

[Chris Parris]

Hi AB-P and the list...

I'll contribute what I know and see if that helps your confusion...

The DEA frequencies that JD posted earlier are indeed nationwide DEA
allocations. They are available and in the radios of every DEA office
across the US. They are not allocated as shared or interoperability
channels, but more on that later.  

However, each DEA region also has access to what are sometimes called
"Local Option" channels. In many cites they have some simplex or repeaters
that are on UHF frequencies other than these first 10 frequencies. These
vary from region to region across the country and a good accurate list of
them is going to be tough to get. They are sometimes very seldom used and
hard to pin down.

And besides these two groups of frequencies, they can use the HIDTA
channels in some areas. So the DEA actually has a lot of frequencies they
can use.

The DEA radios carry all these channels in Zones or what the scanner user
might know as banks. The first zone in the DEA radios usually carries the
first 10 channels that were posted earlier. The second zone usually has the
local option channels, another zone has the HIDTA channels, etc. So even
though they may be on zone 2 on the radio, it might still be called
"Channel 1", because it;s the first channel in that zone. It's whatever the
agents who use these channels like to call them. However, the first 10
common DEA channels have always been referred to by those channel numbers
in the past...

>>>
416.0500 was given as DEA Ops. F-1 and 418.6250 was given as DEA CH 1.
Also, 418.6250 has been previously posted and programmed as a BATF/DEA
Interop frequency.

418.7500 was given as CH 3 and also as a BATF/DEA interop frequency.
<<<

As I said earlier, these frequencies have always been allocated to the DEA.
I don't think they have ever been called "Interop" channels. However,
consider the following - The DEA is part of the Justice Department. The
ATF, formerly under Treasury, is also now part of the Justice Department.
If there was a case involving drugs and guns, could both agencies be
involved? You bet, and there's a good chance they might give the ATF agents
access to some DEA radios But would I call that "DEA / ATF Interop"?. No,
just as I would not call 165.2875 MHz "ATF /. DEA Interop" if the DEA had
an agent working with the ATF on one of their radios.

Federal agencies do sometimes work cooperatively on cases and they do
sometimes show up on other agency's channels. But that is usually not the
norm, and so I would hesitate calling a particular frequency an
interoperability channel just based on that.

- Chris

 --
Chris Parris
Fed Files Columnist
Monitoring Times Magazine
chrisparris at monitoringtimes.com