Woman linked to police killer may plead guilty
Five-year term possible, prosecutor says
TACOMA – A woman accused of helping Maurice Clemmons after he ambushed and killed four police officers last year is expected to plead guilty this week, Pierce County prosecutors say.
Quiana M. Williams is to plead guilty to five counts of first-degree rendering criminal assistance, Deputy Prosecutor Stephen Penner told the News Tribune on Friday.
He said Williams would face up to five years in prison when sentenced if the plea deal goes through as scheduled Thursday.
Authorities allege Williams picked up Clemmons in Seattle on Nov. 29 after he gunned down Lakewood police Sgt. Mark Renninger and officers Tina Griswold, Ronald Owens and Greg Richards at a coffee shop south of Tacoma.
Court records say Williams took Clemmons to her home, helped him bandage wounds he received in the shootings, allowed him to do laundry and lent him her phone before driving him to another part of Seattle and dropping him off.
After a massive regional manhunt, Clemmons was shot and killed by a Seattle police officer on Dec. 1.
Williams pleaded not guilty after her arrest in early December and has been held in the Pierce County Jail since. She is one of six people charged with helping Clemmons or his alleged getaway driver in the aftermath of the shootings.
Efforts to reach her attorney, Kirk “Chip” Mosley, of Tukwila, were unsuccessful Friday and Saturday.
In June, a Pierce County jury convicted Clemmons’ sister, LaTanya Clemmons, of providing aid to the alleged getaway driver, Dorcus Allen. She was sentenced to five years in prison.
Allen is charged with four counts of aggravated first-degree murder as an accomplice. His trial is scheduled for next year.
The four others charged with rendering criminal assistance are to go to trial in October.