Former Wash. deputy admits to robbing Chesapeake bank

CHESAPEAKE

A former sheriff's homicide detective from Everett, Wash., interrupted a Thursday hearing scheduled to question the legality of evidence against him and instead pleaded guilty to robbing a Greenbrier bank. He still faces trials in three more robberies in Virginia Beach and Hanover County.

Preston R. Walcker, 44, lost his law-enforcement job over a painkiller addiction after a job-related injury, according to news reports and interviews. That led to a prescription-fraud conviction, but he later worked as a counselor in Washington state and, here, as an investigator for a Norfolk law firm.

Walcker admitted in Circuit Court to robbing on May 12 a teller at the Old Point National Bank branch on Eden Way North. He got away with $1,100, according to earlier testimony.

"He's trying to do the right thing," his lawyer, Deputy Public Defender A. Robinson Winn, said outside court.

After a lunch break Thursday, the beginning of a video of Walcker's interview with detectives in Virginia Beach was showing on a courtroom wall when Winn told Judge V. Thomas Forehand Jr. that Walcker had changed his mind. He initially was going to contest his confessions on the video, saying that he asked several times for a lawyer and that detectives coerced him by withholding his pain medication, according to Winn.

Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney D.J. Hansen contested that, saying the video would show that police didn't know what the pills were, and didn't want Walcker to become drowsy before his statement. The video wasn't shown in court.

The maximum penalty for bank robbery is life in prison, Forehand reminded Walcker. "I understand," the former deputy responded. The judge scheduled sentencing for Dec. 9.

Before that, Walcker faces trials in Virginia Beach on Oct. 19 and Hanover County, north of Richmond, on Nov. 15.

Matthew Bowers, (757) 222-5221, matthew.bowers@pilotonline.com