Grandmother Accused of Letting Grandson Be Fall Guy in Murder Plot

Photo: Florida Department of Corrections

Leroy Williams

​Thirteen years after watching her nephew get convicted of murdering his step grandfather, Gloria Jean Williams from West Palm Beach has stepped forward to testify that the real killer is her own mother, Mae Daisy Latty.

Alphonso Latty, 59, was murdered at his home in Orlando in October 1994. An article from the Orlando Sentinel says that he was found by his wife of three months, Mae Daisy Latty, who followed the sounds of his agonized moaning to their bedroom. She told police that her husband died before he could tell her who had beaten him so badly. But police were surprised that Mae Daisy Latty had not heard the struggle.

In the week following the murder, Mae Daisy Latty was arrested along with her grandson, Leroy Williams and another man, Walter Gene Chambers. The three were accused of killing Alphonso Latty in the course of stealing his lawn-mowing equipment, which they allegedly planned to  pawn. After following a tip, investigators claimed to have found at least one stolen piece of machinery in Chambers' possession.

But prosecutors eventually dropped their case against Mae Daisy Latty for lack of evidence. Chambers and Williams both accused each other of beating Alphonso Latty to death with a tire iron. Prosecutors took Chambers' side and in testifying against Williams, Chambers got a 12-year sentence. Williams got life.

And that would have been the end of it, except for Gloria Jean Williams, who had moved with her children to West Palm after the murder. Last week she told prosecutors that her mother had let her own grandson take the fall, according to the Orlando Sentinel:

Gloria Jean Williams said it was within weeks of Leroy Williams' 1996 conviction, when her mother threatened her and told her she would kill her "just like she killed Latty."

The paper reports that Williams also testified that his grandmother had convinced him to participate with Chambers in the beating and theft of Alphonso Latty, who she had told them was abusive. Leroy Williams hopes to get a reduction in his sentence.