Williams’ Probation Report Urges Maximum Sentence : Courts: Study says Denny beating showed ‘a high degree of cruelty, viciousness and callousness.’

Damian Monroe Williams’ actions at Florence and Normandie avenues during last year’s riots were not only criminal but unconscionable, a probation report released Thursday said in recommending that he be sentenced to the maximum prison term for his mayhem conviction.

“The fact that the victims and others were not more seriously wounded or killed is more the caprice of fate than the rational behavior of the defendant,” probation officer Alexander Peace wrote in his report.

Williams, 20, was convicted of mayhem for hitting trucker Reginald O. Denny in the head with a brick during a televised attack that became a defining image of the violence and destruction that hit the city. Williams was also found guilty on four misdemeanor counts of assault stemming from attacks on others as they passed through the intersection.

When he is sentenced Tuesday, Williams will face up to eight years in prison for the mayhem conviction and six months for each misdemeanor assault.

The crimes showed “a high degree of cruelty, viciousness and callousness,” Peace wrote, adding that the pattern of Williams’ conduct shows that he is “a serious danger to society.”

Williams’ attorney, Edi M.O. Faal, challenged Peace’s report, which was released during Williams’ sentencing hearing Thursday, noting that it was compiled from police records that Peace had not independently verified. Pointing out that Peace had described Williams’ crimes as premeditated, Faal asked if he knew that the jury had found Williams not guilty on all charges requiring premeditation.

“I don’t know if that is true,” Peace said.

Williams was acquitted on charges of premeditated attempted murder and aggravated mayhem, another charge involving premeditation. Under cross-examination by Deputy Dist. Atty. Lawrence C. Morrison, Peace said premeditation for a probation officer is different than premeditation as defined in a crime.

“For probation purposes, if you plan to do something, that’s premeditation,” he said, adding that by selecting his victims Williams showed premeditation.

Peace said he had watched prosecution videotapes of the attacks at Florence and Normandie. Aside from homicides, Peace said, Williams’ crimes affected him more deeply than those committed by any other criminals except for child molesters.

The probation report also includes the arrest record Williams began compiling when he was 14. Before the Denny beating trial, Williams had never been convicted of a felony.

He was arrested for reckless driving when he was 14, and for allegedly assaulting another boy when he was 15. In April, 1990, when Williams was 17, he was arrested for grand theft auto after he was allegedly seen driving a car that had been taken in a robbery. When he was arrested, police said, he told officers he had bought the car from the man who had reported it stolen.

Police said that while he was in custody, Williams said he belonged to the 8-Tray Gangster Crips, a South-Central gang. The arresting officer said Williams showed no remorse and believed that the auto theft “was a laughing matter.”

Williams was arrested again in July, 1990, for grand theft auto and was counseled and released. In August, 1990, he was arrested for robbery and grand theft auto, charges that were dismissed. In September, 1990, he was arrested for obstructing and resisting a police officer.

He was arrested twice in 1991--once after a hit-and-run accident and later for allegedly resisting and obstructing a police officer. The district attorney’s office declined to file charges after both arrests.

Prosecutors have asked that Williams be sentenced to 10 years in prison, the maximum penalty.