NFL

Man convicted of murdering Broncos’ Williams

Suspected gang member Clark found guilty in 2007 drive-by shooting death

updated 9:21 p.m. ET March 11, 2010

DENVER - The group of Denver Broncos players arrived at the Safari nightclub to celebrate New Year’s Eve and was whisked inside by bouncers. One of the dozens of people waiting in line to get in — an alleged Tre-Tre Crips gang member — took exception.

“We street,” Willie Clark told wide receiver Brandon Marshall, according to court testimony. “We got money too.”

That encounter between celebrated professional athletes and an alleged angry gang member ultimately led to the Jan. 1, 2007, shooting death of cornerback Darrent Williams, a jury decided Thursday, convicting Clark of first degree murder.

“It was a chance meeting and it was a ridiculous altercation that led to this tragic result,” said Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey.

Clark, 26, faces life in prison at his April 30 sentencing.

It took prosecutors and police nearly two years to build their case against Clark, partly because those who witnessed the shooting were part of a gang drug ring that was under federal investigation, Morrissey said. A code of silence kept those witnesses from talking.

Federal drug cases pending against the gang’s members helped crack the case. Several witnesses testified they saw or heard from Clark that he fired shots from an SUV truck into a stretch Hummer limousine carrying Williams and 16 others from the nightclub at 2 a.m. Williams died in teammate Javon Walker’s arms.

“It was this man, who indiscriminately, with universal maliciousness ... took it upon himself to unload his .40-caliber handgun into that limousine full of innocent people,” Chief Deputy District Attorney Timothy Twining said in his closing argument.

Inside the nightclub, Clark continued to confront the athletes, prosecutors said. During testimony, Marshall described Clark as “off the hook” after a member of the Broncos’ entourage sprayed champagne on New Year’s revelers.

Prosecutors portrayed Williams as a peacemaker as his friends argued with gang members.

Marshall, who was at the nightclub but not in Williams’ limo, grew emotional on the stand as he described teammates with bloodstained clothes at a hospital afterward. He said Walker clutched a bloody necklace Williams was wearing and wouldn’t let it go.

Some gang members testified against Clark in exchange for lighter sentences on unrelated crimes. Two witnesses refused to testify against Clark, saying their families would be hurt if they spoke out against a gang member. A third witness spent a night in jail before changing his mind and agreeing to tell jurors Clark confessed to the shooting.

Security was tight throughout the 11-day trial. Thirteen armed deputies stood in the courtroom as the verdict was read. Deputies also were stationed along a hallway outside the courtroom.

Clark declined to testify in his defense, citing threats to himself and his family. Defense attorney Darren Cantor said gang members had threatened to turn Clark into “Swiss cheese” if he said anything in court.

Another defense attorney, Abraham Hutt, maintained that Clark wasn’t even in the SUV when the shooting happened.

“This is what this is about: Willie Clark is a scapegoat,” Hutt told jurors.

Hutt tried to undercut the credibility of five prosecution witnesses who got shorter prison time in other cases in exchange for testifying. Hutt said the five saw their sentences reduced by a combined 188 years.

“We did what we thought was necessary to get the truth in front of those jurors,” Morrissey said.

Hutt said the prosecution’s star witness, Daniel “Ponytail” Harris, faced a life sentence for a drug charge but will be released within two years. Harris testified that he saw Clark fire the shots.

The defense suggested during the trial that Harris had fired into the limo. Harris hasn’t been charged in the case.

A written exchange between the jurors and District Judge Christina Habas during deliberations seemed to center on the possibility that someone else was involved in the shooting.

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Jurors asked Habas if complicity was enough for a conviction. Habas answered that it was, if prosecutors met their burden of proof — even if jurors found that someone else committed all or part of a murder.

Williams was a star cornerback at O.D. Wyatt High School in Fort Worth, Texas. He played at Oklahoma State, where he was a 2003 All-Big 12 selection. The Broncos made him their second-round pick, 56th overall, in the 2005 draft.

CONTINUED : Clark shows no emotion when verdict read

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