The State - News from April 23, 1989

The former mayor of a small farming community in Fresno County, accused of taking a bribe from an undercover FBI agent, testified that the FBI wanted to use him to trap Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, former Fresno Mayor Dale Doig and other elected officials. Alex Valdez, the former mayor of Mendota, and Fresno builder Jerry Harris are charged in federal court with accepting a $5,000 bribe from an undercover agent in 1987 after agreeing to help launder East Coast drug money through Mendota housing developments. Valdez testified that, after his arrest, he was threatened with a 17-year prison term and pressured to work for the FBI to try to trap Brown, Doig, Fresno City Councilman Les Kimber and other elected officials in Fresno County. Valdez said he barely knew Brown, Doig or Kimber and was not told by the FBI agents what the three politicians may have been doing wrong. Valdez said he signed a confession only because FBI agents had grilled him for hours and he was “terrified.”