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LOS ANGELES (CNS) - A state appeals court panel has ordered a new hearing for a man who was convicted in connection with a drug dealer's murder about seven years after the defendant was found guilty of mayhem for a televised attack on trucker Reginald Denny at the outset of the 1992 Los Angeles riots.
The three-justice panel from California's 2nd District Court of Appeal directed a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge to hold a new hearing on Damian "Football" Monroe Williams' bid for re-sentencing in the murder case stemming from the July 18, 2000, shooting death of Grover Tinner at a house in southwest Los Angeles in which crack cocaine was sold.
In their 18-page ruling Wednesday, the appellate court justices noted that the court "must deny Williams' petition for resentencing" if the prosecution meets its burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt that Williams is guilty of murder under current law.
"If the prosecution does not meet its burden of proof, the court shall vacate Willams's murder conviction and resentence him on the remaining convictions," the panel found.
The panel noted that Judge Curtis B. Rappe "erred in relying on our recitation of facts on Williams's direct appeal to establish the facts for deciding Williams's petition for resentencing," and that the judge should instead act as an "independent fact finder to determine whether Williams is guilty of murder under a currently valid theory of murder."
Williams and co-defendant Tyrone David Killingsworth were convicted of second-degree murder for Tinner's killing, with jurors finding that Killingsworth had personally discharged a handgun causing death.
At Williams' sentencing, Killingsworth denied that Williams -- after handing him two guns -- told him some time before the 48-year-old drug dealer arrived, "You know what to do. Don't let me down."
In explaining why he waited until Williams' sentencing to explain his version of what happened that night, Killingsworth said, "I believe we were wrongfully convicted."
Williams, now 50, filed a petition for re-sentencing in 2019 under a state law that affects defendants in some murder cases. He subsequently testified during a court hearing that he had nothing to do with the shooting and that "We didn't expect none of this type of stuff to take place," according to the appellate court panel's most recent ruling.
Williams had been released from prison after serving about four years of a 10-year term for felony mayhem in connection with the Denny attack.
Williams denied he was the person caught on videotape throwing a brick at Denny's head at Florence and Normandie avenues on April 29, 1992.
Denny was pulled out of his big rig a short time after a state jury in Simi Valley acquitted four white Los Angeles police officers accused of beating black motorist Rodney King on March 3, 1991.