Author Jim Lawler, Soulcatcher: Recruitment Operations talk & signing

​Jim Lawler’s talk, titled “Soulcatcher,” delves into the complex motivations that drive ordinary people to commit espionage. Drawing from his extensive 25-year career as a senior CIA case officer, during which he earned prestigious honors such as the Donovan Award, the CIA Director’s Award, the HUMINT Collector of the Year Award, and the Trailblazer Award, Mr. Lawler provides a vivid, hard-hitting account of the realities of intelligence work. Through real-life examples, he reveals the psychological and emotional triggers that lead individuals to betray their countries, and discusses the crucial role that recruiting these intelligence sources plays in safeguarding the national security of the U.S. and its allies.

Come at 5pm for dinner and stay for the talk at 6pm! He will have copies of his three spy novels available for purchase and signing!

James C. Lawler bio:

Mr. Lawler is a national security consultant and a speaker on Insider Threat. He served for 25 years as a CIA operations officer with five overseas assignments from 1982-1994.

Mr. Lawler was in CIA's Senior Intelligence Service from 1998 until his retirement in 2005. He was a specialist in the recruitment of foreign spies and spent most of his CIA career battling the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. As Chief of the A.Q. Khan Nuclear Takedown Team, which resulted in the disruption of the most dangerous nuclear weapons network in history, Mr. Lawler received a CIA Trailblazer Award. DCI George Tenet sent Mr. Lawler this note: “Jim, what you and your team have achieved will rank up there as one of the most spectacular intelligence accomplishments in the history of the CIA. It occurred because of your exemplary leadership. Not only are we in the process of taking down a network, we’re also in the process of disarming a country as a result of your fine work.” DDCI John McLaughlin noted this was “the closest thing I’ve ever seen to a perfect intelligence operation.”

Mr. Lawler also received the Director's Award from George Tenet, the U.S. Intelligence Community's HUMINT Collector of the Year Award, and the Donovan Award from the CIA's Deputy Director of Operations.

Mr. Lawler is a graduate of Rice University and the University of Texas Law School. He has published Living Lies, an espionage story of the Iranian nuclear weapons program, and In the Twinkling of an Eye, about recruiting a spy inside a covert Russian-North Korean bioweapons program. In December 2022, Spyscape named Living Lies as #38 on its list of “Fifty Best Spy Novels Ever Written.” His third spy novel, The Traitor’s Tale, about treachery and treason deep within the CIA, was published in February 2025.

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