Charles L. Chuck Reed was a Special Agent with the FBI’s Philadelphia field office who died from gunshot wounds on March 22, 1996, at age 45. He was working undercover to buy cocaine from a suspect identified as Jonathan M. Cramer in Reed’s car parked in a hotel lot near the Philadelphia waterfront. During the transaction Cramer pulled a gun and shot Reed in the chest and abdomen; Reed returned fire and fatally wounded Cramer. Both men were taken to hospital and later died of their injuries. The altercation was captured on Reed’s body wire and agents nearby heard the exchange and responded.

Reed joined the FBI in 1979 and transferred to Philadelphia in 1980, building a career focused on investigating drug kingpins. His death was the first line-of-duty fatality for an FBI agent in Philadelphia and the second in Pennsylvania. He is buried in Resurrection Park Cemetery in South Burlington, Vermont. Anyone who knew Special Agent Reed or has information about the case is asked to come forward.