GERALD, Missouri, May 24, 2009

How A Phony Fed Fooled A Small Town

Fraudulent Law Enforcer Tells Katie Couric Illegal Arrests He Made Gave Him Adrenaline Rush, Sense Of Purpose

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    Waving a badge he bought online and claiming to belong to the "Multi-jurisdictional Narcotics Task Force," Bill Jakob fooled a small town's officials into granting him the authority of a law enforcement officer. Katie Couric reports.

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  • Bill Jakob

    Bill Jakob  (CBS)

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(CBS)  Asked if he ever saw Jakob do something that was against police procedure, McCrary tells Couric, "Well, I can't say that for sure. Because their procedure and our procedure would be two different things."

"But some of this stuff, it seems to me, is pretty basic. I mean, you're saying he got search warrants, read people their rights, did everything by the book?" Couric points out.

"The search warrants he said he got. You know, he was doing all that over the phone," McCrary says.

"In retrospect, do you feel as if you might have abdicated a little too much responsibility and power to him?" Couric asks.

"Probably so," McCrary admits.

Eventually, Jakob, perhaps fearing that he'd be found out, decided to take matters into his own hands. He told police he was taking Tyson Williams to a federal holding cell for further questioning.

Williams says Jakob put him in his car and told him, "That he's gonna take me to a federal holdover. And, as the conversation went on, he turned around and took me to my girlfriend's house. Told me to call him twice a week. And not to go outside, not even to check the mail."

A few weeks later, the story of Bill Jakob, federal agent, began to unravel. An enterprising reporter with the local paper, the Gasconade County Republican, named Linda Trest did something no one else had done: a background check.

Two months after he joined forces with the Gerald Police, the real FBI arrested Jakob and his cover was blown. It turns out he had a long history of being a conman.

"This isn't the first time that you've lied about something. You've pretended to be an Army veteran injured in Iraq. Do you have a problem with telling the truth?" Couric asks.

Jakob says he is an Army veteran, but that he lied when he told people he had been in Iraq. "I lied on a resume," he says.

Asked why, Jakob says, "Same reason anybody lies on a resume. I wanted a job."

"So this isn't the first time you've pretended to be or do something you aren't or haven't done?" Couric asks,

"It's not like I can't tell the truth. It's not like I've lied to everybody I've met. I told a few lies in my life. And I told one big one," Jakob says.

Continued



Produced by Kyra Darnton
© MMIX, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Add a Comment See all 85 Comments
by Editorial_Response May 27, 2009 12:21 AM EDT
Katie Couric is not that good at her job. She is not that great at reading teleprompters or interviewing anyone, she is at best average. If Katie Couric is so great at her job then tell me one other interview where she was as prepared to take someone apart as she was when she interviewed Sarah Palin. Katie Couric was gromed for the takedown and she did the job. Couric of course is average but pulled off one heck of a hit! She took out a Republican candidate running for the second highest office in the United States of America. It was no small feat and moved her up in rank as a serious investigative reporter/interviewer.

For a person who READS a teleprompter, she did a wonderful job in the Palin interview, and people have really placed a lot of expectations on her shoulders given that. At this time however, I am really surprised that she is on 60 Minutes. I did not know that she was promoted to such a show. I work from 2:30 to 11PM CST and really don't watch much TV any more...I watch like 30 minutes a day totally. I gave up when all the shows promoted Obama and did no investigative reporting on Obama and did not push the socialist on his positions. The major networks GAVE Obama the presidency. I will never watch TV that much again in my life and I am 49 years old. I will never again be that manipulated by any media.

In any case 60 Minutes used to carry quite a bit of weight. 60 Minutes is supposed to be about hard hitting investigative reporting and interviewing.

How does meek, liberal, Katie Couric fit into that program? Well, she is a liberal, produced the resuts that NOBODY else could and earned her stripes that is how.

Now kids. If you want to get ahead, then is just one way. You have to stay true to your ideology and work hard. Curic did just that. If there is one other thing you can learn from all of this is that liberals OWN and OPERATE many different TV stations, and programs, including 60 Minutes. I never knew this very fact before today because 60 Minutes was not based on politics. But the evidence is there now given Katie Curic's promotion to the show....and NO I am, not an investigative reporter, but it sure looks like I could do a better job than Katie or those who remain at 60 Minutes.
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by AdamDisty May 26, 2009 7:46 AM EDT
Seems to me the guy should be made into the POlice Chief of that small town as he clearly did more than all 5 of the cops there put together!

RT
www.useurl.us/126
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by linfinster May 25, 2009 8:54 AM EDT
I highly doubt all the Couric haters could come close to doing her job. You all need to get a life and shut the heck up. You're a joke, a bad one.
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by obamakenobi May 25, 2009 1:35 AM EDT
I still like 60 minutes but it should be changed to 45 mintes when ever she is on. I watch the PBS Newshour. I can't watch ABC, NBC or CBS evening news because they are geared to idiots. The woman has no street cred and should go back to NBC where she really fits in with that Matt Lauer schmuck.
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by obamakenobi May 25, 2009 1:29 AM EDT
Now I get the Green Day song American Idiot. Something about being fed crud by the American Media.
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by obamakenobi May 25, 2009 1:24 AM EDT
Katie Couric reminds me of Roswell, New Mexico.
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by obamakenobi May 25, 2009 1:23 AM EDT
Carie Couric reminds me of Roswell, New Mexico.
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by FyukYiu May 25, 2009 12:04 AM EDT
Katie is not the issue,it's all these small towns that have no clue on anything that goes on outside their little town! Hi i'm Bill and i'm a Fed like the shows on the tube or that their T.V.! Get 'er Done.
Yeeeaaaahhhh...
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by chucktosh May 24, 2009 11:00 PM EDT
At least this loser will get to eat jail food spit and all. Maybe he will hang himself...
Reply to this comment
by josephp5 May 24, 2009 10:55 PM EDT
I'm guessing that a lot of the reason that people on this board dislike Katie Couric is because they are told to dislike her by Republican blowhards like Rush and Sean. After all, Couric did abuse a potential Republican candidate for Vice President with such terribly unfair questions like, "What do you read?" Imagine how unfair it is to expect a relatively unknown candidate to be one 72 year old cancer survivor's heartbeat away from being President to give some insight into what type of material she reads. The candidate was justly stumped by this trick question, unable even to name a single daily newspaper or weekly magazine. Fortunately in a later, more friendly interview on Fox News, the candidate revealed that she was an avid follower of such insightful periodicals as "The Economist".

However, in this interview with Mr. Jakob, I am finding it hard to understand what Ms. Couric said or did that was so off-putting. Obviously the issue is a relevant one---despite some comments that declare that the issue is nonsense since the fraudulent cop "cleaned up the town", Gerald MO now faces 17 lawsuits for false arrest and violations of civil rights and could be bankrupted. And Ms. Couric's questions to Mr. Jakob were nowhere near as confrontational as the "What do you read" question she posed to the Vice Presidental candidate. In fact, Ms. Couric was about as deferential to Mr. Jakob as you can get, merely pointing out that seeing someone with drug paraphernalia may not be enough for a warrantless search, or that Mr. Jakob's self-pity was misplaced as he was going to jail for more than what he claimed was merely locking up drug dealers.
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by fhazejv May 24, 2009 10:19 PM EDT
I have watched 60 Minutes for years but if Katie Couric is going to be on the program, i will not be watching any longer. She screwed up your CBS Evening News and now is doing the same to 60 Minutes. She is terrible! Her segment was so stupid that I switched to Dateline on NBC. I have not watched the CBS Evening News since a few days after she started there and will not watch 60 Minutes either if she is added to the team.
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by josephp5 May 24, 2009 9:48 PM EDT
What a lot of stupidity there is on this comment board.

How can people say that Bill Jakob is a hero for "getting drug dealers off the streets?" Does no one appreciate the concept of individual rights anymore? Have we abandoned the mottos, "Live free or die" and "Give me liberty or give me death" and replaced them with "do whatever you want as long as you claim it's keeping me safe?" Even accused drug dealers have rights. And Bill Jakob violated those rights---he admitted that he refused people the right to have a lawyer (not merely during questioning). We cannot be a nation of laws, not of men, and allow people like Bill Jakob to run loose, regardless of their claims that they are helping us get bad people off the streets (not that I believe that that was his true motive, rather than feeling important and being able to bully people around).

And please, commenters, stop with the unclever declarations that Bill Jakob is as much of a fraudulent policeman as Katie Couric is a fraudulent reporter---that's irrelevant.
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by moultries May 24, 2009 9:06 PM EDT
He is not the only one! These men make a living on these lies, while endangering the public. How many women trusted this man based on this lie? How many people let him in their homes; around their families? How many other paying jobs did he obtain with these false credentials? What if someone would have gotten killed under his "protection. Just watching, it is obvious that he still does not understand the scope of his lies and how it endangered so many. Great job Katie!
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by lindly-2009 May 24, 2009 8:04 PM EDT
About the con man who impersonated a federal officer, I think we might cut him a little slack. After all Katie Curic is impersonating a journalist.
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by cottagestreetgirl May 24, 2009 7:50 PM EDT
As I watched the segment about the impostor cop who fudged his background with a fake business card and a 6 pointed star badge bought on the internet, I thought of the poseur in the white house...how is he any different from this guy?...where are his college records, his birth certificate....who can vouch for him? (besides bill ayers and the reverend wright)
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by golfbeen1 November 4, 2008 1:47 PM EST
No wonder 60 Minutes sucks. I just wasted 15 minutes of my life watching the stupidest story they have ever produced. News? Human interest? Trash? At least trash has some social value. This was terrible jounalism and a waste of time. Katie sure is increasing her journalistic resume. Put Scott Pelley in her place, heck put Andy Rooney in her place. I''m pretty sure Mike Wallace cried himself to sleep Sunday night.
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by rb081857 November 4, 2008 3:46 AM EST
I really disliked the way Katie Couric handled the Sargeant Bill interview. She sounded like the scolding mother. It was embarrassing to watch.
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by rb081857 November 4, 2008 3:40 AM EST
Why was it so easy for this man to catch the drug dealers. The police are forced to spend months building a case and still can''t convict half the time. Something isn''t right here.
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by charliecarol November 3, 2008 9:43 PM EST
Hey Katie
I thought the Sgt Bill segment deserved a big WHOGAS
Who gives a ____
charliecarole
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by u2playnice November 3, 2008 9:18 PM EST
I think this fat fu(k had the nylons over his face too long...
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