Tony Moreno was born and raised in East Los Angeles and has been a member of the Los Angeles Police department for over thirty years. He has been a detective supervisor for almost twenty of those years.

During his career, he has worked numerous assignments relating to gangs including Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums (CRASH), homicide, narcotics, organized crime, school car, gang car, and jail intelligence. Moreno has trained thousands of law enforcement officers throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico on gangs. He is a court-qualified gang expert and a licensed private investigator in the state of California.

While assigned to LAPD Gang Detail from 1982 through 1986, he was nicknamed "Pacman" by gang members because of the yellow Plymouth Fury police vehicle he drove. Due to his reputation and work in the area of gangs, his nickname and a replica of his police vehicle were used in the movie Colors.

Moreno has been a featured speaker at the California Gang Investigators Association (CGIA) conference and other conferences for many years. In 2005 he published his book Lessons from a Gang Cop.