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Loved wife, murder suspect says
Wednesday, January 23, 2002 By Mike Bucsko, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
In a quiet and sincere manner, Connie Williams testified yesterday as the sole defense witness in his homicide trial and professed his love for his wife, Frances.
Afterward, skeptical prosecutor Chris Connors had a question.
"Mr. Williams, if you loved her so much, how were you able to saw her head off?" Connors asked.
Williams said he didn't remember performing such an act, though a homicide detective testified an hour or so earlier that Williams told him of the dismemberment before he led police to Frances Williams' head and other body parts.
Frances Williams, 48, suffered a fatal, 5-inch stab wound on Aug. 18, 1999, that punctured her heart and breastbone before her head, hands, feet and part of her left leg were removed, pathologist Dr. Bennett Omalu testified. Connie Williams claimed for months that his wife had left and he didn't know where she had gone.
Williams, 50, testified that he remembered nothing about Frances Williams' killing until five months later when he was asked about her disappearance by Pittsburgh homicide Detective Dennis Logan.
But Williams admitted he feigned ignorance about his wife for months after her family began inquiring about her whereabouts.
"I didn't have the heart to tell them," Williams testified. "I was frightened to tell them."
Williams was the final witness during a whirlwind day of testimony in the first day of his trial before Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Lawrence J. O'Toole. The seven women and five men on the jury will begin deliberations this morning following closing arguments from the defense and prosecution.
Williams, formerly of Crafton Heights, could face the death penalty if convicted of first-degree murder in his wife's death.
Williams was convicted of second-degree murder in 1974 after he pleaded guilty to stabbing to death his landlord, C.W. Hopkins, 47, of the North Side. Police estimated Hopkins was dead for three or four weeks when his decomposed body was found under Williams' bed.
John Elash, Williams' attorney, told jurors Williams was "retarded," illiterate and dropped out of Perry High School in 10th grade. Williams testified that since his release from prison 20 years ago, he had worked a variety of jobs to take care of his three children from another marriage.
The children -- James, 19, Maria, 18, and Roy, 17 -- were the topic of considerable friction between the Williamses, Connie Williams testified.
The night of her death, Frances Williams told her husband the kids had to go or she was filing for divorce, Connie Williams testified. The argument escalated when Williams confronted his wife with marijuana he found in her purse.
"I wanted the relationship to work even though I found out she was smoking that stuff," said Williams, who testified he does not smoke tobacco, drink alcohol or take illegal drugs.
During the argument, Williams said, he "hit her" with the knife he was using to cut a steak.
Two of Frances Williams' daughters and one of her sisters testified earlier yesterday that they tried in vain in late 1999 to learn from Connie Williams about her whereabouts. Connie Williams told them his wife left him on Aug. 12 and he had not seen her since.
Williams told Carol Miller, one of Frances Williams' daughters, that he fought with her mother after she found a pair of women's underwear in their home and her mother did not believe his explanation that the underwear belonged to his daughter. Connie Williams also told Miller that he gave her mother a $5,000 charge card and he was waiting to receive a billing statement to learn about her activities.
On Nov. 10, 1999, Carol Miller testified that she went to Connie Williams' home and found him inside with a woman she did not know and three children. Miller said she stopped at the home to find out whether her mother planned to call her the next day because Nov. 11 was Frances' birthday.
"He looked me right in the face and said, she will call you," a teary Miller testified.
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