Joseph Carroll ( DIA ) Lieutenant General Joseph Francis Carroll ( 19 March 1910 – 20 January 1991 ) was the founding director of the Defense Intelligence Agency ( DIA ) , and the Air Force Office of Special Investigations ( AFOSI ) . Youth & Education . General Carroll was born in Chicago , Illinois . He was graduated from St . Mary of the Lake Seminary , Mundelein , Illinois , in 1933 with a bachelor of arts degree and earned a J . D . degree from Loyola University , Chicago , Illinois , 1940 . He was a member of the Illinois State Bar Association from 1940 to his death . Gen . Carroll left the Seminary of St . Mary on the eve of being ordained a deacon , a transitional stage leading to ordination to the priesthood , in order to have a relationship with Mary Morrissey , who was to become his wife . After working with Swift and Company , a meat - packing concern , in Chicago , where he rose to a position as assistant sales manager , soon after completion of law school , he left to join the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) . Carroll was survived by his wife , Mary , and five sons , one of whom is former priest and writer James P . Carroll . Time as a special agent . General Carroll joined the FBI in October 1940 , where he served as a special agent in field offices at Memphis and Knoxville , Tennessee , before assignment to the Chicago , Illinois field office . He was instrumental in catching noted gangster Roger " Tough " Touhy , which brought him to the personal attention of FBI Director J . Edgar Hoover . In May 1944 , he was transferred to the Washington headquarters of the FBI , where he held progressive positions as supervisor in charge of bank robbery and kidnapping matters , chief of the Criminal Section , and first assistant to the assistant director of the FBI in charge of the General Investigations and Accounting Division . At the end of World War II , the U . S . Government was faced with the problem of disposition of war surplus property throughout the world . Upon special request from the administrator of the Surplus Property Administration , Carroll was lent by the attorney general and the director of the FBI to the Surplus Property Administration ( later the War Assets Administration ) . In this assignment he organized and directed the Compliance Enforcement Division , directing all investigative activity associated with surplus property disposal . In May 1947 , he was recalled to his former position in the FBI as an administrative assistant to the director of the FBI . Military service . When the United States Air Force was established as a separate executive department under the National Security Act of 1947 , Secretary of the Air Force W . Stuart Symington , requested FBI Director J . Edgar Hoover to loan General Carroll to the services to organize an Air Force agency for investigative and counterintelligence functions . He organized and directed this new organization , the Office of Special Investigations , along the lines of the FBI rather than the U . S . Army ' s Criminal Investigation Division ( CID ) . General Carroll was tendered a commission as a colonel , U . S . Air Force Reserve , January 12 , 1948 . He was ordered to active duty in the grade of brigadier general May 6 , 1948 , and promoted to major general August 11 , 1950 . From the time of his entry on active duty on May 6 , 1948 , General Carroll served as the first director of the Office of Special Investigations , creating and organizing this centrally - directed investigative service , establishing district offices to service the air commands in the United States , and furnishing trained specialists to Air Force activities worldwide for the conduct of special investigations . On September 6 , 1950 , he was appointed Deputy Inspector General ( IG ) for Security , U . S . Air Force , In this assignment he was responsible for the security and physical protection of Air Force installations and activities against sabotage , espionage , and other hostile threats . In this capacity , he directed the Office of Special Investigations , the Office of the Provost Marshal , U . S . Air Force , and was responsible for all security plans and policy for the U . S . Air Force . Until 1952 , General Carroll had been a member of the U . S . Air Force Reserve on active duty , On January 29 , 1952 , he was granted a commission into the Regular Air Force as a permanent colonel by a special act of Congress . General Carroll was then assigned to Wiesbaden , Germany , April 1 , 1958 , as Deputy Commander ( Rear ) for the U . S . Air Forces in Europe ( USAFE ) . He served in that capacity until November 1959 when , under a command reorganization , he was named Chief of Staff , USAFE . While there , he was stationed with his close friend from seminary , Monsignor , and later Major General and Air Force Chief of Chaplains , Edwin R . Chess . On February 1 , 1960 , General Carroll was promoted to lieutenant general and became The Inspector General of the U . S . Air Force stationed at Headquarters , U . S . Air Force , in Washington , D . C . He remained in that position until October 1 , 1961 , when the secretary of defense , Robert S . McNamara , appointed him to his last assignment as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency , with the responsibility for controlling Department of Defense ( DoD ) intelligence resources assigned to DIA and reviewing the intelligence functions assigned the military departments in satisfying the intelligence requirements of the DoD . He retired September 15 , 1969 . On January 20 , 1991 , General Carroll died due to complications related to Alzheimer ' s Disease .