PROBE GOES ON IN SUSPICIOUS DEATHS OF 2
Charlotte Observer, The (NC)
Author: Associated Press
Dateline: APPLING, Ga.
Georgia and S.C. authorities are focusing on suspicious insurance policies and family finances in the 1991 deaths of a Columbia County teacher`s aide and her 12-year-old son.
But investigators still lack enough evidence to make an arrest, and say the fact that the victims lived in Georgia but were found in South Carolina complicates the probe.
``By accident or by purpose, whoever killed them and took them across state lines created a hellacious problem,`` said Columbia County sheriff`s Investigator Gary Palmer. ``We have two states and two sets of laws.``
The bodies of Linda Williams, 39, and Shaun, the son she adopted from El Salvador, were found June 19, 1991, in the family`s minivan in the Sumter National Forest in Edgefield County, S.C.
The van had been driven into a tree and set afire. Police called it an attempt to hide that Williams had been beaten to death and Shaun strangled.
Police said the family recently had sought bankruptcy protection, and that a $500,000 life insurance policy had been taken out on the victims only weeks before they were killed.
Police say they consider Williams` husband of 17 years, Luke A. Williams III, a suspect. He has denied involvement in the killings.
Luke Williams told detectives his wife and Shaun left home around 7 a.m. June 19 for a daylong shopping trip to South Carolina.
Williams declined repeated requests for an interview.
``Mr. Williams is upset,`` said lawyer Ed Stalnaker. ``His silence is at my direction.``
Luke Williams is trying to claim $250,000 in life insurance from State Farm on a $500,000 policy bought less than a month before the slayings.
Linda Williams` parents, Fred and Dora Azrak of Miami, said they are prepared to sue to stop Luke Williams from collecting the insurance.
State Farm is withholding the money pending the outcome of the criminal investigation.
If it does pay, the company maintains it only owes half of the $500,000 policy because Linda Williams failed to take a required physical exam before her death.
U.S. Bankruptcy Court records show the Williamses were more than $10,000 behind in payments on their house and faced pressure from creditors on their two cars.
In 1990, the couple filed for bankruptcy protection.
Linda Williams brought home $850 a month and Luke Williams, injured in a 1987 construction accident, was receiving $2,130 monthly in unemployment.
Three months after filing for bankruptcy, he settled his injury claim for $43,000.
Stalnaker wrote an insurance company that the Williamses invested the $43,000. But Azrak said his daughter was unaware of the settlement, and accidentally discovered it months later.
Last month, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John Dalis denied Luke Williams protection, saying he had had ample time to sue for his wife`s insurance. The move cleared the way for foreclosure.
Police learned that Linda Williams had contacted United Way`s Help Line shortly before her death and was referred to a shelter for battered women. The shelter`s phone number was found in her purse.
Two days before she was killed, Linda Williams confided to her parents that she was afraid, but didn`t elaborate.
``We kind of brushed it off as nonsense,`` Fred Azrak said.