Girlfriend is last witness

Testimony concluded late Wednesday in the quadruple murder trial of Wesley Jonathan Williams, with his girlfriend Bridgette Kelly the last witness called.
Williams is accused of killing ex-girlfriend Danielle Baker and her three young sons, two of whom he fathered. The bodies of Baker, three-week old Aaron, one-year-old Amarion and nearly four-year-old Ahmaad were found at Baker’s dwelling at Cottondale Village Apartments in Marianna on March 17, 2005.
Ahmaad and Amarion belonged to Baker and Williams, and the infant to Baker and another man.
Closing arguments in the case are scheduled to begin around 10 a.m. today.
Jurors will not start deliberating the case until Friday morning, however.
Because no limit has been set for either lawyer in their closings, and because they could potentially talk about all 69 witnesses who were called at trial, Circuit Judge Bill Wright anticipates that each could argue as long as two hours.
He said he thought it would be better for the jury to begin fresh Friday, rather than starting deliberations late Thursday and perhaps having to be sequestered at a motel overnight.
Defense attorney Walter Smith spent Wednesday morning building scenarios he hopes will fortify reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors.  His presentation hinted at a variety of motives that would move suspicion away from his client.
The state asserted that Williams killed Baker and the children for three main reasons: he didn’t want to pay the child support she was seeking, he resented her meddling in his personal affairs regarding other women, and he blamed her for his troubles with the IRS.
To refute those claims, Smith called Bridgette Kelly late Wednesday afternoon.
She testified that Williams had often helped Baker and loved all his children. For instance, he paid to have Baker’s lights turned on when she and her children moved from Sneads to Marianna. He would often provide other things Baker needed, Kelly testified.
Kelly said she often took Baker places she needed to go, sometimes at the direct request of Williams.
As for the children, she said, Williams had Ahmaad’s name tattooed on his arm and was a solid presence throughout the boy’s short life.
When he learned five months after Amarion’s birth that he was the father of that child as well, Kelly testified, Williams simply said he wasn’t surprised.
Kelly said she wasn’t surprised, either, even though she and Williams were in a relationship when Baker’s child was conceived.
“It was no secret that he was fooling around,” Kelly said. “He did his thing and I pretty much did what I wanted to. There was no reason for me to be upset with Danielle.”
Smith also questioned her about Williams reaction when Baker, a few days before she died, revealed to Kelly that Williams was allegedly involved with another woman in the neighboring community of Sweetwater, in the Bristol area.
Kelly acknowledged that Baker, she and another woman were on a three-way call that night. Kelly and a relative of the other woman talked about Williams going to see the woman the Sunday before Baker was killed. They described the clothes he was wearing, as Kelly listened in.
Kelly said, however, that she didn’t discuss that disclosure with Williams.
Kelly said she and Baker had a friendly relationship throughout the years, and talked almost daily. In fact, she said, they talked on the phone the night before Baker was killed. She said Baker seemed happy and unworried in that conversation.
Other witnesses had also described Baker’s last night as a carefree one. It was something of a “girls night in” at her home that evening. She had fixed a friend’s hair, cooked a meal and invited a few people over to share dinner.
Under intense cross-examination by prosecutor Larry Basford, Kelly stuck to her story on every point.
Basford tried to get her to admit she was upset that Williams was seeing other women, and that he’d fathered Amarion and a child by another woman during their relationship.
But that woman, Jessica Godwin, backed Kelly up on that point when Basford recalled her in his rebuttal after the defense rested.
Godwin said Kelly went to her workplace and told her she wasn’t upset about Godwin and Williams having a child together.
Basford also asked Kelly about Williams whereabouts on Sept. 16, 2005, and the early morning hours of Sept. 17, the day Baker’s body was found.
Cell phone records indicate Williams’ phone connected with a tower near Baker’s home in the early hours of Sept. 17, shortly before the killings are believed to have occurred.
Kelly testified that Williams came home to Sneads before 3 a.m., but acknowledged that, when she learned of the cell phone record and asked him why he’d been in Marianna, he hadn’t told her.
Basford also pressed her about the child support issue.
Kelly maintained Williams never got notice that the Department of Revenue was seeking child support for Ahmaad and Amarion.
She acknowledged that a deputy came looking for him once at her home, and that she’d lied about the fact that he lived there. She told the officer Williams had moved to Tallahassee, when in fact he was staying with her. But she denied the deputy had told her he was there to serve the child support papers, although the officer had earlier testified he did tell her that was why he’d come.
Her testimony also included statements about the income tax matter.
The IRS was seeking reimbursement for a refund Williams got when he claimed Baker’s daughter as his dependent in the early 2000s. The little girl, who was found unharmed in the Baker apartment the morning her family was slain, belonged to another man.
Kelly testified Baker and Williams worked out that scheme together and that Baker had provided the child’s Social Security number in order to make it happen.
They split the refund, she said, with Baker receiving about $1,000.
Kelly said Baker couldn’t be blamed for that, since Williams took the step of his own accord.
She said Williams conceded that he owed the tax debt and had resigned himself to having the IRS take roughly $5,000 out of his future tax rebates.
Kelly spent more time on the stand than any other witness presented at the trial.