CASE AGAINST WILLIAMS RESTS WITH WITNESSES.

Byline: Josh Kleinbaum Staff Writer

The California Supreme Court denied a bid last week to reopen the murder case against Stanley Tookie Williams, which defense attorneys claim was based on ``shoddy'' crime-scene evidence and questionable witness testimony.

Chief Justice Ronald George and Justice Joyce Kennard voted to reopen the case, but four other justices found a review was unwarranted.

Here are highlights of the testimony and evidence against Williams:

--Alfred Coward and Tony Sims each testified at separate trials that they participated in the 7-Eleven robbery on Feb. 28, 1979, and that they saw Williams take Albert Owens into a storage room and shoot him twice in the back with a shotgun.

Coward was granted immunity for testifying at Williams' trial.

Sims, who was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison, said he went along with the robbery because he feared Williams.

``I knew if I wouldn't have went in the store, he probably would have did something to me. Like killed me or something,'' Sims testified during Williams' trial.

--In 1979, Williams was living with James and Ester Garrett. The couple testified that Williams told them information about the three murders at the Brookhaven Motel that only the killer would know.

--Shotgun shells recovered at the Brookhaven Motel were traced to a shotgun purchased by Williams in 1974. The shotgun was given to police by the Garretts, who said that Williams put it beneath their bed.

--Sam Coleman, who was with Williams when he was picked up by police after the slayings, testified that Williams bragged about killing three people who lived on Vermont Street - the location of the Brookhaven Motel.

Coleman later claimed the testimony was coerced by police, but a three- judge panel on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that claim.

--George Oglesby, a fellow inmate at the Los Angeles County Jail and a jailhouse informant, testified that Williams came up with an elaborate escape plan, which included using dynamite to blow up the van taking prisoners from jail to court. The plan called for killing guards and other inmates. Handwritten notes by Williams - including his trademark habit of using stars to dot his I's - corroborated the story.

Oglesby also testified that Williams admitting while in jail to committing the motel murders.