THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, October 12, 1995 TAG: 9510120314
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ANGELITA PLEMMER AND KATE HUNGER, STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: Long : 106 lines
The 22-year-old triggerman in a contract killing was sentenced to death Wednesday after he pleaded guilty to murdering a Deep Creek businessman's wife for $4,000.
Marlon Williams was hired by Clark Bedsole, owner of Clark Electric, to kill Bedsole's estranged wife, Helen, in November 1993 during a bitter divorce settlement. Bedsole was sentenced in August to life in prison after a jury convicted him of orchestrating the murder.
Bedsole was afraid that his wife would take half of his assets. He also wanted to collect on his wife's life insurance policy, valued at more than $100,000.
Helen Bedsole was found dead in the kitchen of her Geneva Shores home, shot once in the head and once in the neck. Clark Bedsole had paid Williams $3,000 after the slaying on Nov. 9, 1993, and owed him $1,000 more.
Prosecutors had sought the death penalty against Williams, arguing that his criminal record made him a danger to society and he showed no remorse. They had sought a life sentence against Bedsole because he had no criminal background to indicate he would be a danger to society and there was insufficient evidence to support the death penalty.
Judge Russell I. Townsend Jr. deliberated a little more than an hour before sentencing Williams to death. He said he had considered the nature of the crime, the victim's family, Williams' troubled childhood and juvenile record, and his escalating pattern of criminal behavior and violence.
``It is difficult and causes soul-searching and some amount of anguish,'' Townsend said before pronouncing sentence. ``(Such a case) imposes a great deal of pressure on one person.''
It was the third time since summer that a death sentence has been recommended or imposed against a convicted killer in Hampton Roads. In August, Norfolk Judge William F. Rutherford upheld a jury's sentence and ordered that Derek Barnabei die for the 1993 rape and murder of an Old Dominion University student. In July, a Virginia Beach jury recommended the death sentence for Michael Clagett, convicted of murdering four people at the Witchduck Inn in 1994.
This is the second time in three years that Townsend has sentenced a convicted murderer to death. In 1992 Townsend sentenced Andrew Chabrol to death. He was executed in June of 1993.
Townsend characterized Williams as ``a manipulative, aggressive, dangerous and violent person.''
``For nothing but money, he walked in and killed somebody,'' Townsend said. ``And if that was not enough, the culminating factor was the . . . grandmother of his girlfriend . . . he cuts her throat.''
A police informant testified that he helped police secretly audiotape Williams as he confessed to the murder of Helen Bedsole. In the confession, Williams said he would have emptied all eight of the bullets from the murder weapon - a .380 semi-automatic - if the gun had not jammed.
During the recording, Williams also confessed to slitting the throat of 71-year-old Virginia Parker, the grandmother of his estranged girlfriend, Tinisha Alston.
Parker testified that she was home alone in Suffolk Oct. 3, 1994, when she heard someone break into her front door. As she sat on the edge of her bed, a masked man appeared and stood for several seconds at her bedroom door.
``Who are you and why are you here?'' she asked. The man raised his fist and walked toward her.
He hit her several times, knocking her back onto the bed as she cried, ``What have I ever done to you?''
The man tried to smother her with a pillow from her bed as she fought for her life, she testified.
``I stopped talking to him and started talking to the Lord,'' she said.
Her attacker then slit her throat.
``Lord, the man is trying to kill me,'' Parker recalled thinking. ``I felt the blood running.''
Her attacker snatched the phone from the wall and left.
Parker, her gown covered in blood, ran to a neighbor's house for help.
On the witness stand, Parker showed the scar that runs from ear to ear. She also pointed to other cuts she suffered in the attack.
Alston testified that in an earlier attack, Williams beat her in a church parking lot, leaving her unconscious. He took her to a hospital, but threatened to kill her if she told authorities he had beaten her.
Williams had also plotted another act of vengeance - he planned to kill the rest of the Alston family. The police informant testified that Williams believed if he killed Alston's family, Tinisha would commit suicide. Before the attack on Parker, Williams and the informant had watched Alston's house for a week and determined how to kill Alston's parents and younger brothers.
On Halloween night, Williams, wearing a robber's costume, planned to ring the family's doorbell, say, ``Trick or treat,'' and open fire on the family. The informant would be waiting for him in a car to help him escape. But he never carried out the plan.
During the two-day sentencing hearing, Williams showed no emotion. Relatives of Helen Bedsole, some wearing yellow silk flowers, cried and said they were grateful for the judge's sentence.
``I think justice will be served,'' said Steve Hoggard, Helen Bedsole's nephew. ``. . . The only appropriate penalty is death, and he got that.''
In court a day earlier, Williams' maternal aunt, Jean Brooks, apologized to members of the Alston and Bedsole families. ``We are very, very sorry for what (Marlon) has done. . . I feel today like I'm going to Dewayne's funeral, and he's my little boy.''
Brooks had testified about Williams' turbulent childhood and detailed his abuse by his stepfather and mother. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
Marlon Williams, 22, was hired by Clark Bedsole to kill his wife.
KEYWORDS: CAPITAL PUNISHMENT MURDER FOR HIRE SENTENCE by CNB