A man wanted in connection with an alleged kidnapping and shooting in Iowa spent nearly 14 years living under an assumed name in San Diego, where authorities say he worked as a chef and even appeared in local media.
The double life ended Tuesday when US Marshals tracked the fugitive to a business in Mission Beach and took him into custody.
Brian Anthony Williams, 50, had been wanted since a 2012 Davenport case in which the US Marshals Service says he and other alleged coconspirators kidnapped a woman, assaulted her and shot her before dumping her in a field in northwest Davenport.
Williams was charged with first-degree kidnapping, assault causing serious injury, conspiracy to commit a felony and first-degree arson. He also faced a charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.
He allegedly fled Iowa in 2013.
By the time federal investigators got a tip in September, authorities say he was living in San Diego as “Troy Williams” and working as a chef.
And the wanted man wasn’t exactly living like a ghost.
Investigators found local publications and television news reports featuring a man believed to be Williams under the assumed identity, according to the Marshals Service.
One Times of San Diego profile identified Troy Williams as the head chef at Miss B’s Coconut Club.
The profile described his upbringing in New York City’s Queensbridge Housing Project and recounted his claims of overcoming police assaults, racial discrimination and poverty.
Federal authorities now say the man presented to the public as Troy Williams was actually Brian Anthony Williams, who had been wanted in Iowa for years.
The Marshals Service said Williams remained a fugitive for nearly 14 years, including appearing in Quad Cities news coverage as a most-wanted fugitive and on the agency’s Southern District of Iowa website.
Marshals located him Tuesday at a business in the 3700 block of Mission Boulevard.
“This arrest is a perfect example of those who think they have bested law enforcement and evaded arrest,” US Marshal Ted Kamatchus of the Southern District of Iowa said. “Deputy US Marshals remain resolute in their relentless pursuit of the most dangerous offenders in our society.”
Williams is expected to be extradited to Iowa to face the charges from the 2012 case.
