Ex-CHP Officer Admits Posing Twice as FBI Agent

A former California Highway Patrol officer from Canyon Country has pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to two counts of impersonating an FBI agent.

William Francis Wilson Jr., 43, pleaded guilty earlier this week to presenting himself on April 10 as an FBI agent to the employees of two groceries, Carlton’s Market on Ramona Boulevard in El Monte and Tresierras Market on Van Nuys Boulevard in Pacoima, said Assistant U. S. Atty. Carolyn Kubota.

A man who told employees that he was an FBI agent on the trail of counterfeit cash took $93,000 from Tresierras Market on April 10, authorities said.

Plea Bargain

On June 22, Wilson was arrested on suspicion of attempted robbery by El Monte police after employees of Carlton’s Market called police to report that a man who identified himself as an FBI agent had asked to examine their cash.

Under the terms of a plea bargain worked out with federal prosecutors, five other counts of impersonating an FBI agent were dismissed against Wilson, Kubota said. Wilson faces a maximum of six years in prison on the remaining two counts, she said. He is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 15.

Wilson still faces prosecution by the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office on a robbery charge stemming from the Tresierras Market incident, a charge of attempted robbery in the Carlton’s Market incident and charges of attempted grand theft and attempted robbery in an April 10 incident in which a man tried to take money from La Placita Market on Laurel Canyon Boulevard in Pacoima, authorities said.

Wilson operated a private-investigation business after his resignation from the CHP in 1978. He worked for the CHP in Newhall and West Los Angeles for 13 years.

Wilson was indicted on the federal charges after his June 22 arrest.

Sprayed the Money

During his preliminary hearing on the state charges, employees at Tresierras Market testified that a neatly dressed man carrying a brown valise identified himself as an FBI agent on the trail of a counterfeiter and asked to inspect their cash.

The man then took an aerosol can from his valise and sprayed the bills, saying that, if they faded, they were counterfeit, the employees said. He then pointed a gun at the market’s bookkeeper, tied her up and left with the money, they said.

The owner of La Placita Market, however, became suspicious when a man asked to inspect money there, telling the man to return later, according to testimony during the preliminary hearing. And employees of Carlton’s Market called the police when a man asked to inspect cash there, they testified during the preliminary hearing.

Wilson is free on $25,000 bail. He has been ordered to appear for a pretrial conference on the state charges in San Fernando Superior Court on Oct. 28.