Shannon ‘Cat’ Catalano

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After graduating from Loyola University Chicago with her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Criminal Justice, Shannon Catalano “Cat” began working for the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office.

Throughout Sergeant Catalano’s 14 years in serving the community with the Sheriff’s Office, she spent seven of those years in Investigative Services, where she is currently assigned.  Her prior investigative assignments included working in the Major Crimes/Homicide Unit and Cold Case Unit.

Currently, she is the detective sergeant of the Human Trafficking Unit, is an active member of the Peer Support Unit and Crime Scene Investigations (CSI) Team.  She also works in an on-call capacity for the Homicide Unit.

Sergeant Catalano’s passion is cold cases, including the identification of unidentified human remains, and forensic genetic genealogy.

Sergeant Catalano is halfway through completing a graduate certificate program for forensic genetic genealogy at University of New Haven in Connecticut.

Sergeant Catalano is a Santa Clara County/Gilroy native who has been married for 14 years and has three children, including one living with a rare disease, pediatric mastocytosis.  Outside of work, she works hard to champion for research, advocacy, and awareness for all people living with mastocytosis, especially children.

Sergeant Catalano believes it is an absolute honor to work cold cases and appreciates the opportunities given to her at the Sheriff’s Office.

Ultimately, Sergeant Catalano hopes to give names back to victims, provide answers to victim’s families, and wants offenders held to answer for their actions.