Ex-Orange County Cop Who Headed U.S. Embassy Security in Libya Resigns

A former Orange County police officer who became an acclaimed, high-ranking officer in the U.S. Department of State is one of three senior government officials to resign today in the wake of an unflattering report about management and security errors leading to the Sept. 11 Benghazi, Libya attacks that murdered the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

Charlene R. Lamb–a California Polytechnic University at Pomona graduate–began her law enforcement career as a police officer in the city of Orange, eventually joined the state department's Diplomatic Security Division and most recently served as a deputy assistant secretary at the federal agency.

Lamb was responsible for embassy security that has been labeled as “grossly inadequate” and “a massive failure” by members of congress.

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“I made the best decisions I could with the information I had,” Lamb told a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in October. “We had the correct number of assets in Benghazi at the time of 9/11.”

Lamb's state department biography celebrated her career as “rising quickly” and noted that she repeatedly volunteered for high-risk, overseas assignments in places like Lebanon, Jordan and Tel Aviv.

During her career, she won numerous awards for outstanding public service and is given credit for the capture of an FBI-wanted terrorist in Tanzania, according to the state department.

Terrorists stormed the poorly protected U.S. government property in Benghazi on Sept. 11 and killed Ambassador Chris Stevens.

Orange County Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa) has repeatedly claimed without evidence that President Barack Obama masterminded a pro-Muslim terrorist protection strategy to help him win re-election following the attack.

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R. Scott Moxley

CNN-featured investigative reporter R. Scott Moxley has won Journalist of the Year honors at the Los Angeles Press Club; been named Distinguished Journalist of the Year by the LA Society of Professional Journalists; obtained one of the last exclusive prison interviews with Charles Manson disciple Susan Atkins; won inclusion in Jeffrey Toobin’s The Best American Crime Reporting for his coverage of a white supremacist’s senseless murder of a beloved Vietnamese refugee; launched multi-year probes that resulted in the FBI arrests and convictions of the top three ranking members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department; and gained praise from New York Times Magazine writers for his “herculean job” exposing entrenched Southern California law enforcement corruption.

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