A federal judge handed former Schofield Barracks soldier Naeem Williams a life prison sentence Friday for killing his 5-year-old daughter Talia in their military family quarters in 2005.
Williams, 35, faced life in prison without the possibility of parole as the only sentencing option for capital murder after a U.S. District Court jury failed in July to find he deserved the death penalty. That same jury had found Williams eligible for the death penalty after previously finding him guilty of capital murder for killing his daughter through child abuse and through a pattern of abuse and torture.
Four of the jurors attended Friday’s sentencing, two of them saying they did so for closure to one of the most gruesome murder trials in Hawaii in recent years — the first death penalty case to go to trial since statehood.
In handing down the sentence, U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright said a life prison term with no opportunity for release, "given the jury’s findings, is absolutely appropriate."
Seabright presided over Williams’ trial last year during which he said he thought to himself, "This courthouse had never heard testimony like that before."
That testimony included admissions by Williams that he beat his daughter over a seven-month period almost daily, first with a plastic ruler, then a belt and his fist, and depriving her of food. The testimony also included admissions from Delilah Williams, whom Seabright labeled as Talia Williams’ evil stepmother, that she too beat the girl with a belt, stomped on her, lifted her up by the hair — pulling out clumps of it — and slammed her stepdaughter’s head into a wall.
Seabright said other testimony stood out, like when an Army investigator said Naeem Williams described his daughter as "Teflon tough" because she didn’t yell out or scream when getting beaten.
"Clearly, Talia was dehumanized. She was treated worse than an animal should be treated," Seabright said.
He said other testimony that stood out was Williams’ admission that on at least three occasions, he beat his daughter after binding her head to toe to a bedpost with duct tape and placing duct tape over his asthmatic daughter’s mouth so she couldn’t scream. At least two of those times, Williams even placed duct tape over his daughter’s eyes.
"It’s hard to imagine the pure terror Talia felt that day," Seabright said.
Williams declined to make a statement to the court before Seabright sentenced him. He submitted a signed waiver of his rights to appeal his conviction to the court Friday.
Seabright told Williams that he can still change his mind and has 14 days to file an appeal.
Juror Sonny Kaona of Koloa, Kauai, said he didn’t expect Williams to make a statement.
"But it would have been nice to hear something from him," Kaona said.
He said he hopes Williams’ waiver is some sort of acceptance for what he did.
Jane Auten of Waikoloa, Hawaii, who also was a juror, said she never heard Williams say he was sorry, and she also did not expect him to say anything at his sentencing. One of the reasons Auten said she attended the sentencing was to hear what Seabright had to say to Williams.
"He voiced so well what so many of us felt. So it was important that I heard his words in person," she said.
Auten said she was impressed with what Seabright had said to Delilah Williams at her sentencing last year.
Seabright sentenced Williams, 31, to 20 years in prison in June for killing her stepdaughter through torture. The 20 years is the sentence Williams agreed to when she pleaded guilty and agreed to testify in trial against her husband.
According to U.S. Bureau of Prison records, Williams is serving her sentence in a low-security federal correctional institution in Dublin, Calif. With time off for good behavior, her projected release date is June 13, 2023.
