Murder Suspect Featured on TV Show Is Shot to Death After Chase

David Polson, who fled from his Culver City home last week after neighbors recognized him as a murder suspect described on the television show, “America’s Most Wanted,” died Wednesday morning in a shoot-out with FBI agents in Merced County.

The FBI said Polson, described by acquaintances as a swaggering, knife-carrying “soldier-of-fortune type of guy,” was fleeing from pursuing FBI agents and California Highway Patrol officers when his truck spun out of control and crashed into a haystack at a dairy near Los Banos.

“He brandished a gun, which initiated a shoot-out,” FBI agent Tom Griffin said. “He is dead.”

Polson, 40, a one-time flight instructor in San Diego who claimed to have served as a civilian pilot for the CIA, had disappeared earlier this year after he was charged in the murder of Janice Anderson, 32, a former student of his who had been living with him in the San Diego area.

Anderson disappeared on Christmas Day, 1986. Three weeks later, her body was found dumped beside a road about 30 miles north of Las Vegas. Las Vegas police said she had been stabbed 11 times.

Polson was indicted in the murder, but a Las Vegas judge dismissed the charges after ruling that evidence that might have cleared him was not presented to the grand jury. Then, last May, after hearing all the evidence, another grand jury in Nevada’s Clark County re-indicted him in the murder. By that time, Polson had vanished.

It was about then, neighbors said, that a man moved in with a woman named Linda Zimmerman at her modest home on Revere Place in Culver City.

“He called himself David Zimmerman,” said one neighbor, Shane Ambers, 20, a UCLA student.

“David was the sort of guy who liked to carry a knife on his belt and brag about his exploits,” Ambers said. “He told us how he was in on all these secret missions, smuggling drugs for the CIA. Linda said later that he told her that President Bush, who used to head up the CIA, wanted to get rid of him, so he set him up with this murder.”

Ambers, who at the time knew nothing about the murder, said he was watching “America’s Most Wanted” on television the night of Sept. 10 when the program aired a segment on the murder of Anderson. Film of Polson was featured.

“It was David Zimmerman,” Ambers said. “It was his face, his jeans, his boots, his voice, his speech patterns, the way he smokes his cigarettes--everything. Everyone in the neighborhood saw it. Everyone knew he was still there, in that house. Everyone was frightened for their lives.”

Ambers said he and other neighbors called the number provided by the television show to report their suspicions, but the line was busy, and it took some time for the calls to get through.

“We get about 1,500 calls after each show on Sunday night,” explained Phil Gonzales, a spokesman for the program in Los Angeles. “A lot of them aren’t pertinent. The ones that are, we turn over to the appropriate police agencies.”

Culver City Police Sgt. Stan Williams said he and several other officers headed for the home on Revere Place as soon as the department was notified.

“I got down there about 12:30 (a.m.),” Williams said. “He was already gone.”

Several minutes later, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police--given Polson’s cellular phone number by Ambers--called Polson in his four-wheel-drive pickup, and he promised to turn himself in. However, police said, Polson failed to appear and further attempts to reach him were unsuccessful.

Linda Zimmerman, convinced that she might be Polson’s next victim, helped investigators. “She gave us information on the phone calls he made to her throughout the week,” Las Vegas Police Lt. Kyle Edwards said. “She finally realized what kind of a person she was dealing with. . . . We now know he had no intention of turning himself in and was, in fact, trying to change his identification and leave the country.”

FBI agents said they began searching western Merced County on Wednesday morning after receiving a tip from Las Vegas police that Polson was in the Los Banos area. Griffin said two agents spotted him about 8 a.m. at a restaurant on Interstate 5. The agents said they were waiting for backup assistance when Polson suddenly drove off.

“I guess he picked up on the fact that we were following,” Griffin said.

FBI agents and CHP officers said they chased Polson about eight miles south on Interstate 5 and east on California 152. They said he made several U-turns in an attempt to escape before his truck hit the haystack.

The FBI said it had not been determined whether a highway patrolman or an FBI agent fired the shot that killed Polson.