DRUG ARRESTS WERE REAL; THE BADGE WAS FAKE

GERALD, Mo. -- Like so many rural communities in the country's
middle, this small town had wrestled for years with the woes of
methamphetamine. Then, several months ago, a federal agent showed up.

Arrests began. Houses were ransacked. People, in handcuffs on their
front lawns, named names. To some, like Mayor Otis Schulte, who
considers the county around Gerald, population 1,171, "a meth capital
of the United States," the drug scourge seemed to be fading at last.

Those whose homes were searched, though, grumbled about a peculiar
change in what they understood -- mainly from television -- to be the law.

They said the agent, a man some had come to know as "Sergeant Bill,"
boasted that he did not need search warrants to enter their homes
because he worked for the federal government.

But after a reporter for the local weekly newspaper made a few calls
about that claim, Gerald's antidrug campaign abruptly fell apart
after less than five months. Sergeant Bill, it turned out, was no
federal agent, but Bill A. Jakob, an unemployed former trucking
company owner, a former security guard, a former wedding minister and
a former small-town cop from 23 miles down the road.

Mr. Jakob, 36, is now the subject of a criminal investigation by
federal authorities, and he is likely to face charges related to
impersonating a law enforcement officer, his lawyer said.

The strange adventures of Sergeant Bill have led to the firing of
three of the town's five police officers, left the outcome of a
string of drug arrests in doubt, prompted multimillion-dollar federal
civil rights lawsuits by at least 17 plaintiffs and stirred up a
political battle, including a petition seeking the impeachment of Mr.
Schulte, over who is to blame for the mess.

And the questions keep coming. How did Mr. Jakob wander into town and
apparently leave the mayor, the aldermen and pretty much everyone
else he met thinking that he was a federal agent delivered from
Washington to help barrel into peoples' homes and clean up Gerald's
drug problem? And why would anyone -- receiving no pay and with no
known connection to little Gerald, 70 miles from St. Louis and not
even a county seat -- want to carry off such a time-consuming ruse in
the first place?

Mr. Jakob's lawyer, Joel Schwartz, said that what happened in Gerald
was never a sinister plot, but a chain of events rooted in "errors in
judgment." Mr. Schwartz said he believed that at least three Gerald
police officers, including the chief, knew that Mr. Jakob was not a
federal drug agent or even a certified police officer.

"It was an innocent evolution, where he helped with one minor thing,
then one more on top of that, and all of the sudden, everyone thought
he was a federal agent," Mr. Schwartz said. "I'm not saying this was
legal or lawful. But look, they were very, very effective while he
was present. I don't think Gerald is having the drug problem they
were having. I've heard from some residents who were thrilled that he
was there."

There were numerous arrests during Mr. Jakob's time in Gerald (the
exact number is uncertain, local law enforcement officials said, as
legal action surrounding the case proceeds), but Mayor Schulte said
that Mr. Jakob had, in fact, gone to elaborate lengths to deceive
local authorities, including Ryan McCrary, then the police chief,
into believing that he was a federal agent -- with the Drug
Enforcement Administration, the Marshals Service or some other agency.

In addition to having a badge and a car that seemed to scream law
enforcement, Mr. Jakob offered federal drug enforcement help, Mr.
Schulte said. (Local officials thought the offer must have somehow
grown out of their recent application for a federal grant for radio
equipment.) Mr. Jakob even asked Chief McCrary to call what he said
was his supervisor's telephone number to confirm Gerald's need for
his help, the mayor said.

When the call was placed, a woman -- whose identity is unknown --
answered with the words "multijurisdictional task force," and said
that the city's request for federal services was under review, the
mayor said. Mr. Schulte said he now suspects that Mr. Jakob adapted
the nonexistent task force name from the "Beverly Hills Cop" movies
starring Eddie Murphy.

"Not only were these officers taken in, but so was everybody else,"
said Chet Pleban, a lawyer for Mr. McCrary and the other two members
of the police force who lost their jobs after Mr. Jakob's real
identity came to light.

Of the firings, Mayor Schulte said, "Nobody wanted to, but the city's
lawyer recommended it."

When residents first began noticing Mr. Jakob, he certainly looked
the part. His hair was chopped short, residents recalled, and his
stocky chest filled a black T-shirt he sometimes wore that read
"Police." They said he wore military-style boots, pants with pockets
running down the legs and carried a badge (his lawyer said it was
from a former job as a security guard in St. Louis). And his
off-white Ford Crown Victoria was decked out with police radios and
internal flashing lights, residents said.

He first came to town in January, his lawyer said, to meet Chief
McCrary, whose experiences serving in Afghanistan Mr. Jakob had read
about in a local newspaper. Mr. Jakob was considering contract work
overseas, Mr. Schwartz said, and the pair hit it off.

Soon, the arrests began. Some of those whose homes were searched said
they had been kicked in the head and had had shotguns held against
them. Mr. Jakob, many said, seemed to be leading the crew of Gerald
police officers.

"He was definitely in charge -- it was all him," said Mike
Withington, 49, a concrete finisher, who said Mr. Jakob pounded on
his door in May, waking him up and yanking him, in handcuffs, out
onto his front yard.

Mr. Withington said he had not yet been charged with a crime; Gary
Toelke, the Franklin County sheriff, confirmed that no local charges
had been issued against him. But the mortification of that day, Mr.
Withington said, has kept him largely indoors and led him to consider
moving. Since the search, residents have tossed garbage and crumpled
boxes of Sudafed (which has an ingredient that can be used to make
methamphetamine) on his lawn, he said, and he no longer shops in
town, instead driving miles to neighboring towns.

"Everybody is staring at me," he said. "People assume you're guilty
when things like this happen."

When Linda Trest, 51, a reporter at The Gasconade County Republican,
started hearing complaints from people whose homes had been searched,
she began making inquiries about Mr. Jakob.

"Once I got his name, I hit the computer and within an hour I had all
the dirt on this guy," Ms. Trest said.

As it turned out, Mr. Jakob, who is married and lives near
Washington, a small town not far from Gerald, filed for bankruptcy
protection in 2003 when he owned a trucking company, and had, at 22,
pleaded guilty in Illinois to a misdemeanor charge of criminal sex
abuse of someone in their teens.

Since the 1990s, he had worked, at times, as a police officer in tiny
departments in towns like Kinloch, Mo., and Brooklyn, Ill., though he
never seemed to stay anywhere long and was never certified as a
police officer in either Missouri or Illinois, his lawyer said.
(Under some conditions, short-term employees with some departments
are not immediately required to have state certification.)

As in Gerald, he impressed some, if only at first. "He seemed to have
experience on the street," said J. D. Roth, the police chief in
Caseyville, Ill., where Mr. Jakob was a temporary part-time officer
for almost two months in 2000. "He walked the walk and talked the talk."

In Gerald, just a day before it was revealed that he was not a
federal agent, the city aldermen voted to make Mr. Jakob a reserve
officer; he wanted the designation, Mr. Schulte said, so he could
enforce local ordinances, and he stood before the aldermen, hands
behind his back, seeking the title.

Mr. Jakob offered city officials three contact numbers -- his
personal cellphone, a cellphone he said he used for drug informants
and his "multijurisdictional task force" cellphone, Mr. Schulte said.

"It was the movie, 'Catch Me if You Can' all over again," said Mr.
Schulte, referring to the 2002 film starring Leonardo DiCaprio as a
master of deception. "I'm telling you, with this guy, everything was right."