(Stillwater, Okla.) — District Attorney Tom Lee said today that he will not retry former OSU basketball player Darrell Williams, whose sexual assault convictions returned by a Payne County jury in 2012 were overturned by a state appellate court two months ago.
“The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals ordered a new trial because jurors were exposed to and discussed several jurors’ personal observation of the crime scene in violation of the trial court’s order,” Lee said.
“The two victims of Williams’ criminal acts, who courageously testified about the incident, desire to move on with their lives after college and not go through the trauma of testifying again,” Lee said in a news release.
“Lee respects their decision and has decided not to prosecute further,” the news release said.
Williams, now 24, was convicted on July 23, 2012, of sexually assaulting two female students shortly after they arrived at an off-campus party in Stillwater several hours after a game in December 2010.
The jury had deliberated for nearly eight and one-half hours before finding Williams guilty and recommending one-year jail terms for each of his rape convictions and no incarceration for a sexual battery conviction.
Williams was held in the Payne County Jail for nearly three months pending his sentencing before District Judge Phillip Corley, who ordered his release on Oct. 12, 2012, when he suspended the balance of his two concurrent one-year terms.
Calling Williams “a level one sex offender,” the Payne County judge had then ordered him to enroll as a sex offender, which he no longer can be required to do — since the appellate court reversed his convictions two months ago.
Williams, a Chicago native, had proclaimed his innocence two years ago at his sentencing in the large courtroom packed with his supporters. The alleged victims were not present.
When Williams was released to probation two years ago, District Attorney Tom Lee told KUSH, “The victims of this case have the sympathy of our office and the admiration of our office in that they reported this incident to police and fully cooperated with the investigation and testified in court.”
“It was very hard for them to do that. The Stillwater Police Department detective division did an excellent job in its investigation and presentation of charges and their testimony in court.
“The jury was very attentive and heard the evidence and determined the defendant was guilty. Judge Corley sentenced the defendant as the jury recommended,” Lee said two years ago. Jurors had acquitted Williams, who was 6’8″ and weighed 232 pounds, of one count of rape by instrumentation of a then 23-year-old OSU student, who was 5′ and weighed 100 pounds. It convicted him of one count of sexual battery of that student and recommended no incarceration.
Jurors had acquitted Williams of one count of rape by instrumentation of a then 21-year-old OSU student, who was 5’7″ and weighed 130 pounds, that was alleged to have occurred at a party between 2 a.m. and 2:30 a.m. on Dec. 12, 2010, inside the basement of a house at 5th and Lewis Streets in Stillwater. Jurors had convicted Williams of two other counts of rape by instrumentation of that same OSU student outside the house — once by a fence and once by a truck. For each of those counts, the jury had recommended the minimum sentence of one year.
During the trial, jurors listened to a 40-minute audiotaped recording made by now-retired Stillwater Police Detective Inspector Les Little, in which Williams said he was drunk at the party that he and five of his teammates attended.
Prosecutor Jill Tontz urged jurors to again look at cell phone video of the defendant at the party: “Darrell Williams is glassy-eyed, swaying back and forth.”
She reminded the jury that the victims repeatedly identified Williams as their attacker.
When Williams was convicted by jurors, the detective inspector said, “These victims are the bravest girls — these girls stood up against what was done wrong to them. They never changed their story. They looked him in the eye and stood up to him.” According to a pre-sentencing investigation, the defendant’s mother, Alice Williams, who lives in Illinois, believed that her son was wrongfully accused and convicted.
“My son, Darrell, worked so hard to get to where he was at to have it all snatched away by two Caucasian females. My son was not given a fair jury selection; there was not one African-American. My son was treated unfairly in Payne County.”
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