After graduating law school, at the age of 24, Younger became an FBI Special Agent. As an agent he was one of
J. Edgar Hoover's top agents. In the early 1940s, it was later revealed that Younger, as an FBI agent, was one of several agents tasked by Hoover with spying on
International Longshore and Warehouse Union President,
Harry Bridges, while he was staying at The Edison Hotel in New York City. Bridges discovered his phone and rooms were tapped after he became suspicious when hotel staff insisted on him using a room different from his usual accommodations and following a trail of wires from his phone to an adjoining room. Bridges secretly left the room, unbeknownst to the FBI agents keeping tabs on him, went to the roof of an adjoining hotel, and spied on agents listening to the taps believing Bridges was still in the room. After a few days watching the agents with colleagues, reporters, and a photographer, Bridges called the police, leading to the agent on duty jumping out the window and down the fire escape, leaving behind abandoned wires and a carbon paper with the name "Evelle J. Younger, Special Agent" on the desk with his equipment. The incident led to national ridicule towards the Bureau.
U.S. Attorney General Francis Biddle insisted Hoover inform
President Franklin Roosevelt about the incident personally, and accompanied him to the White House. After hearing the story, Roosevelt smiled and slapped Hoover on the back, remarking, "By God, Edgar, that's the first time you've been caught with your pants down." Younger later became a member of
CIA forerunner the
Office of Strategic Services, serving in the Burma-China-India theater during
World War II. Younger served in the
United States Army during
World War II as well as Korea. He was a municipal
judge in California from 1953 to 1958 and a superior court judge in California from 1958 to 1964, when he became district attorney of Los Angeles County. He also rose to the rank of Major General in the US Air Force Reserve, and was the first to be promoted to the rank of Brigadier General (Reserve) as a Special Agent in the AF Office of Special Investigations. During his time as the Los Angeles district attorney, he oversaw criminal cases which included the prosecutions of
Charles Manson and
Sirhan Sirhan. He is the first prosecutor in the United States to prosecute mass felony charges against college campus demonstrators in the 1960s. Younger retired from public service in 1979 and joined the firm Buchalter, Nemer, Fields, & Younger as a senior partner (named Buchalter, Nemer, Fields, Chrystie and Younger at the time). ==Personal life==