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William Ernest
LEASURE
A.K.A.: "Mild
Bill"
Classification: Murderer
Characteristics: Corrupt
policeman and contract killer
Number of victims: 3 +
Date of murders: 1977 - 1986
Date of birth: 1946
Victims profile: Ann
Smith (a friend's wife) / Tony de los Reyes (the husband of a woman friend of Leasure's)
/ Gilberto Cervantes (Tony de los Reyes' wealthy stepfather)
Method of murder:
Shooting
Location: Los
Angeles County, California,
USA
Status: Sentenced to
15 years to life on two counts, 1991
Murderer with a badge
The Secret Life of a Rogue Cop. By Edward Humes
In "Murderer With a Badge," Edward Humes presents us
with a puzzle. William Ernest Leasure, called Mild Bill by his fellow
Los Angeles police officers, lived up to his nickname in "his
unremarkable 17-year record as a traffic cop."
Yet from 1976 to 1986, prosecutors charged, he "committed
every crime from murder to fraud, from theft to perjury." Nothing in his
personality explained why a man who issued warnings instead of tickets,
who never rebelled against authority or abused a suspect, would pirate
yachts, orchestrate three murders or stockpile guns.
Mr. Humes, the author of an earlier true-crime book,
"Buried Secrets," writes that Mr. Leasure "never displayed the
personality of a thrill killer -- or any other kind of killer. He never
liked to hurt anyone or anything, not people or animals." The single
thread that runs through this detailed account is that he liked to
impress and to help his friends.
In 1991 Mr. Leasure accepted a plea-bargain agreement
on two charges of second-degree murder and received a mandatory prison
sentence of 15 years to life. Despite Mr. Humes's admirable assembling
of the facts, the secret of William Leasure remains inviolate.
Killer Says Policeman Ordered Murders
Witness says William Leasure, also suspected of
masterminding a yacht theft ring operated partly in Newport beach, hired
him
By Lois Timnick - Los Angeles Times
April 19, 1991
LOS ANGELES — An admitted hired killer testified
Thursday that he murdered two people on orders from veteran Los Angeles
policeman William Leasure and drove the car in a third shooting that he
said was paid for by Leasure.
Dennis France, 45, testifying under a promise of
immunity from prosecution, told jurors that he contacted police after
Leasure's 1986 arrest because he got nervous.
"Me and Bill (Leasure) had done a lot of things
together," France said. "We'd bought (gun) silencers, we'd stole boats,
we'd killed people, we'd broken into places."
Asked by Deputy Dist. Atty. Jim Koller whether he had
been worried that he, too, might be arrested, France replied:
"No. Not so much as I was afraid of being killed . .
. I knew of the murders and I could connect him with 'em."
The witness said Leasure drove the getaway car for
two slayings, "plus he paid me and arranged 'em and set 'em up."
France said Leasure paid him $3,500 for shooting Ann
Smith, a friend's wife, who was robbed and killed in her mother's
Highland Park beauty shop on the eve of the couple's acrimonious divorce
hearing in May, 1980.
"(Leasure) told me to go in and make it look like a
robbery and then shoot, and that's what I done," France testified. "I
told Bill there was people inside and I couldn't do it. He told me it
had to be done today and we weren't coming back.
"I just went in and did it."
Leasure was arrested in 1986 aboard a stolen yacht
near Oakland, and is suspected of masterminding a multimillion-dollar
yacht theft ring which allegedly operated partly in Newport Beach. He
faces charges in Northern California alleging the reselling of stolen
pleasure boats and insurance fraud.
In September, 1981, France said Leasure engaged him
again, this time to kill Tony de los Reyes, the husband of a woman who
was a friend of Leasure's. France said that when the intended victim
left a San Fernando Valley bar, Leasure waited in the car in the back
alley with the motor running after telling France, who was armed with a
shotgun, to rob him.
"I told Tony to bring me his wallet, but he put his
girlfriend in the car and walked around to the other side. I told Bill
he wasn't bringing me his wallet.
"Bill said, 'Shoot,' so I shot," France testified.
France, a short, stocky man who speaks matter-of-factly
about killing and other crimes, said he had been present in a friend's
Paramount apartment when Leasure arrived with an envelope containing
$1,000 the witness said was partial payment for a third murder--the 1977
shooting of Tony de los Reyes' wealthy stepfather, Gilberto Cervantes.
France said he had not yet met Leasure when he drove the car for the
triggerman, who told him "a police officer wanted this done."
Leasure, who was fired from the Police Department in
1988 for knowingly possessing a stolen vehicle, is charged with murder
and conspiracy in the deaths of Smith and De los Reyes. If convicted, he
could be sentenced to death.
The defense, which is expected to cross-examine
France today, has characterized the prosecution's star witness as "a
liar, thief, extortionist, schemer and braggart."
SEX:
M RACE: W TYPE: T MOTIVE: CE
MO:
Corrupt policeman and contract killer.
DISPOSITION:
15 years to life on two counts, 1991.
