Man Found Guilty In Deaths of Fetus, Mother
Killer, Who Thought He Was Father, Faces Life Term
A former teacher was convicted yesterday in Prince William County Circuit Court on charges of beating his pregnant girlfriend to death with a baseball bat to kill her fetus.
Judge Richard B. Potter found Carlos D. Williams, 27, of Dale City guilty on charges of unintentional murder, feticide and abduction in the January slaying of Cheri Washington, 17, a senior at C.D. Hylton High School in Woodbridge. As the judge read his verdict, relatives and friends of Washington's nodded silently, breaking their restraint to let out a sob or a quick clap.
When he is sentenced in May, Williams faces life in prison. Washington's relatives -- as well as the county's chief prosecutor, Paul B. Ebert (D) -- said yesterday that although they are happy with the verdict, they wish that the law would have allowed for the death penalty.
Although there was evidence that Williams wanted to kill the fetus, there was no proof that he intended to kill Washington, Ebert said. Williams maliciously beat his girlfriend at his Dale City home but ultimately helped her get dressed and released her, demonstrating that he did not intend to kill her, Ebert said. That precluded Ebert from pursuing the death penalty.
Washington died of her injuries at a hospital the next day. Her fetus -- in its fifth or sixth month -- was also killed.
"This is a horrendous case. If the law applied, it deserved capital punishment. I know the family feels that way," said Ebert, whose office has put several defendants on death row during his decades-long tenure. "The case points out how cumbersome and frustrating capital cases can be, especially when you rely on categories as a prerequisite to seek the death penalty."
Experts in criminal law agree that the Prince William case is highly unusual because it is rare that a defendant would have intentions to kill both the woman and her unborn child. "This is the kind of case you find in a law school classroom," said Richard J. Bonnie, a professor at the University of Virginia.
This month, a Fairfax County man was convicted of killing his pregnant girlfriend and her unborn child. But prosecutors could not seek the death penalty because they could not prove that he intended to kill the fetus.
In the Prince William case, evidence showed that Williams assaulted Washington on Jan. 27 because he thought she was pregnant with his child. He didn't want the baby, but Washington did. A cousin of Williams's -- Stephen Covington Jr., who witnessed the attack and faces the same charges -- testified that he saw Williams beat Washington's stomach with a baseball bat, wrap her ankles and wrists in duct tape and stomp on her.
After Washington was freed, she was found by a motorist and eventually taken to a hospital, where she died. DNA tests later showed that Williams was not the father.
"I feel really good. I really do," said Joann Washington, 54, Cheri Washington's mother. "But I would have liked to see him get the death penalty. It doesn't make sense to me. If he just wanted to kill the fetus, then why did he beat her in the head and everywhere else?"
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nt/article/2005/12/20/AR2005122001492.html
Posted by Editor at December 21, 2005 06:22 AM
