Justice Comes for Darrent Williams

Hopefully, peace comes now to the family and friends of Darrent Williams. His killer, Willie D. Clark, is no longer alleged, but guilty.

Can we now ask all professional athletes to pause and learn from this? To avoid putting yourselves and your money, status, talent and misguided machismo in these can't-win scenarios? You may think you've earned your way into bottle service in the VIP room at the club, behind the velvet rope or inside the darkened hallway, where your young, entitled nights can be enjoyed freely and recklessly.

You are targets. You are not invincible. You may cause trouble or invite it, simply because of who you are, who you are with or what you think you may be.

Please. Stop and think. Look at what can happen.

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Darrent Williams was just like you. Maybe a little smarter, more responsible. The Denver Broncos cornerback died at the age of 24, in the early darkness of New Year's Day 2007. He was shot and bled to death inside a stretch SUV, a vehicle intended to be a safety net rented for him by his agent, so that Williams would not harm himself or his friends that night drinking and driving after attending a celebrity athlete's party at a downtown Denver club.

That club became a deadly place where famous professional athletes and common gang thugs -- hell-bent on proving who was richer, better and badder -- came together in a collision that turned ugly and violent.

Williams wasn't the target. He was every bit Clark's unintended victim that night. A bystander. And a requiem for all those left behind -- his guilt-ridden Denver Broncos teammates, his devastated Broncos franchise, his shaken, adopted city of Denver, his hometown of Fort Worth and all those left to mourn his tragic death.


Williams' mother, Rosalind, after the verdict. A Denver jury on Thursday convicted Clark -- a Crips gang member accused of ambushing and killing Williams and wounding two others on that fateful New Year's Day 2007 -- on all 21 counts in his indictment. Among them: two counts of first-degree murder, one for killing Williams after deliberation, the other for murder with "extreme indifference."

It was, on all counts. A brutal murder of a young father, who would never again hold his then-seven-year-old son, Darius, and his then-four-year-old daughter, Jaelyn.

Extreme indifference, for destroying the life of one of the NFL's brightest young stars in a hail of 14 bullets sprayed into Williams' rented Hummer SUV as it navigated snow-covered Speer Blvd in downtown Denver just after 2 a.m.

An altercation inside a party at a nearby nightclub celebrating NBA star Kenyon Martin's birthday pitted rich athletes -- unwittingly flaunting their fame and money -- against gang bangers, who seized a chance to exact revenge for a pointless insult.

Witnesses testified during the trial that Broncos wide receiver Brandon Marshall's cousin sprayed champagne inside the Shelter/Safari club, igniting a confrontation in the VIP area. Another Broncos teammate, Elvis Dumervil, tried to calm both sides.

Convicted murderer Clark, 26, gestured as if he had a gun, the jury learned. A chase ensued. Marshall testified, "I yelled, 'You ain't got no [expletive] gun!" and described to the jury how he challenged the gang members before slipping in the snow.

Is it any wonder now that the supremely talented Marshall can't function like a professional on a day-to-day basis in his Broncos' uniform? Why he can never play for that franchise again? He was an idiot that night. Now he's haunted. He's damaged goods.

A single bullet from this explosive fit of ego, anger, misplaced retaliation, gang violence and sheer stupidity struck Williams in the neck as he sat inside the fleeing SUV, tore through his jugular, and he slumped over into the lap of Broncos teammate Javon Walker, bleeding profusely. Williams, already dead, never knew what hit him.

Those left behind live with the consequences every day.

Williams has been gone more than three years now, and there are casualties everywhere. Children without a father. His mother, Rosalind, saw her son's life snuffed out, knowing that her boy Darrent could have made a real difference, far beyond his ability to intercept passes and play lock-down cornerback for the Broncos. But his murder at 2:10 a.m. on Jan 1, 2007 came at the hands of a hideous scourge Williams was seeking to eliminate.

"Darrent's legacy will live on for all of us in the Broncos organization."
-- Broncos owner Pat Bowlen Why do young men and women, displaced by hopelessness in their communities, choose gang lifestyles and then gun for each other? Williams wanted no part of that sort of pointless violence in his hometown of Fort Worth.

I know. Williams and I talked about it on Dec. 31. 2006, in the Broncos' locker room after Denver played the San Francisco 49ers at Invesco Field. Denver had lost 26-23 in overtime, the last contest of the regular season. Williams had a good game that afternoon. We talked about his performance, about our common ground as Texas natives.

I'll never throw away these notes, because they haunt me, too. Williams -- always smiling, always eager to offer great football insight or a riveting personal story -- told me about what he wanted to do in his offseason.

"I'm gonna work with kids back in Forth Worth to stop gang violence, to tell them to stay away from the drugs and to pray to the Lord," said Williams, who admitted to me he once hung around with Crips members in his neighborhood. I wished him luck.

We both had plans that frigid evening. I would go to one New Year's Eve party in downtown Denver, he was headed to another.

I returned to my hotel at 7th Ave. and Speer at about 1:45 a.m. Twenty minutes later, I heard loud popping sounds outside the hotel window. Those were the gunshots ripping through Williams' SUV, four blocks away.

I thought they were firecrackers.

"Nothing can ever bring Darrent Williams back or ease the suffering for Rosalind and her grandchildren," Broncos owner Pat Bowlen said Thursday in a statement. "But after three long years, it is very gratifying to see closure brought to this case. This process has been extremely difficult for the Williams family, his friends and teammates, this community, and the entire Denver Broncos organization.

"Darrent's legacy will live on for all of us in the Broncos organization, and the outstanding work done each day at the Darrent Williams Memorial Teen Center is a tribute to his impact on this community. Our hearts continue to go out to the entire Williams family."

Rosalind Williams listened as Thursday's guilty verdict was read aloud and she remained composed. But even though she spoke quietly afterward about her reaction to justice for her son's murder, her words were soaring and powerful.

"It has been three years, three months and 11 days, but today ultimately shows that no one wins. My family didn't win. The Clark family didn't win," Williams said. "I lost my son, my only son, and his children lost their father. This doesn't bring him back. But I just want ... something has to happen in society for us to stop gang violence. It just has to stop.

"I have a few more answers, but a lot of questions," Williams continued. "What would cause someone to do a senseless crime, to do a drive-by shooting? I think that's just such a cowardly act."

She took pride in the fact her son was the peacemaker that fateful night, not the instigator. Still, Darrent Williams' sound mind and clear heart as danger enveloped him meant nothing in the end.

He is still gone.