Crime & Justice

For the first time, prosecutors reveal the details of an Anchorage woman's 2014 murder

Details of how 54-year-old Irma Williams died were at last revealed Thursday during her killer's sentencing in Anchorage, a hearing that concluded with an imposed prison term of 40 years.

The wealth of evidence leading to the decades-long sentence for Michael Memeo, 48, was largely circumstantial, said Assistant District Attorney Gustaf Olson. Memeo pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in December.

Memeo admitted to the facts laid out in confidential court documents, Olson said before describing the brutal details of Williams' death.

Williams' family reported her missing to Anchorage police on Sept. 30, 2014. She had last been seen by her family two weeks earlier. Her body was discovered in a shallow grave on Oct. 15, 2014, near Lions Park in the neighborhood of Mountain View. It would be a month before police reported Williams' death as a homicide, but their investigation was well underway, according to sentencing remarks.

Police arrested Memeo on murder charges in December 2014 and described him as an ex-boyfriend of Williams. Olson said in court that Memeo was the last person seen with Williams.

The charging document alleged the murder happened on or around Sept. 14, but a hard date could not be established, Olson said. But detectives are certain Memeo murdered Williams in his apartment.

In Memeo's home they found a significant amount of newly purchased cleaning supplies. He cleaned the space well after the murder, but police were able to pull DNA evidence from the floor and the ceiling, Olson said.

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The blood spattered on the ceiling had been cast off from a metal bar used for a weight set, the suspected murder weapon. The weights were found in Memeo's apartment but the bar was missing, Olson said.

A list of additional evidence supports the theory Memeo committed the murder – he'd been using her phone and bank card; his son's vehicle was caught on camera driving by the park around the time Williams' body was discovered; and a shovel with dirt was retrieved, though the soil was never tested.

Memeo sat hunched, staring at the defense table as the investigation was recounted. His publicly appointed lawyer, Daniel Lowery, said his client had not been taking his schizophrenia medication and was using methamphetamine at the time of the murder.

When given the chance to speak, Memeo gave a terse statement apologizing "for the trouble I caused." He promised to stay on his medication and off drugs, "so nothing like this ever happens again."

Lowery noted the earliest Memeo could be released from prison is in 27 years, if he behaves while behind bars and accumulates good time. Memeo would be in his 70s, the defense attorney said.

Irma's son Sha-Clane Williams said his mother likely would have forgiven her killer. He doubted he could do the same, he said. Sha-Clane described Irma as his best friend and a woman who opened her home to family and strangers in need.

"We didn't have the best life but she always made the best of it," he said, adding he once believed she would always be in his life.

"I never thought this would happen in a million years."

Jerzy Shedlock

Jerzy Shedlock is a former reporter for Alaska Dispatch News. He left the ADN in 2017.

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