Willie Woods

Case record: Willie Woods

Background

Willie Woods was a Los Angeles city electrician with the General Services Department. He was a 12-year veteran of the department. His work included carpet installation and vehicle maintenance.

Randall Bacon, the department’s general manager, said Woods had been dealing with performance issues and had received negative performance evaluations. Bacon said Woods received on-the-job counseling for the last few days before the killings, and supervisors had been dealing with him about performance issues for the last eight months.

Co-workers said Woods “seemed like a mellow guy.” His problems with his supervisors started 6 months before the killings. One of those interactions involved Woods throwing a chair across the room while he was being counseled by one of the victims.

The offence

On Wednesday July 19, 1995, Woods went to work at the Piper Technical Center in Downtown Los Angeles with payback in his mind and a gun in his hand.

At 10 a.m., after a brief argument about a negative performance evaluation, he left the room and returned moments later with a 19-shot Glock semiautomatic pistol. He shot and killed four supervisors in the offices of the Piper Tech technical center.

Two supervisors were killed in their work cubicles. Woods then walked downstairs to the basement and hunted down his other two victims, killing one in a hallway and the other in another office. The police said Woods apparently used his city identification card to pass an outside guard, then pulled a Glock semiautomatic handgun inside.

After the shootings, Woods ran out a rear door and was chased by police officers who had stopped by Piper Tech to pick up supplies. He surrendered without incident.

Victims

Woods killed four department supervisors in the General Services Communications Department:

• Anthony Gain
• Neil Carpenter
• James Walton
• Marty Wakefield

James Walton was 60. Anthony J. Gain was identified as an office supervisor and was 72. Neil Carpenter was 61. Marty Wakefield was 57. Another description in the record identified Gain as 78 and said he had worked for the city of Los Angeles for 53 years and was its most senior employee, continuing working years after he could have retired and drawn a pension equal to his salary. Phil Henning, the city’s assistant personnel director, said Gain had “been working essentially for free.”

Investigation

Lieut. John Dunkin said, “He came in this morning; there was some kind of dispute; the four victims were shot.”

Three of the victims were pronounced dead at the nearby County-University of California Medical Center. A hospital spokesman said at least two had been shot in the back, and the fourth died at the scene.

The Piper Tech complex contained various city services, including a rooftop police heliport, forensic laboratories, patrol car garages, and print shops. It also contained the crime laboratory made famous in the O. J. Simpson murder case, where Dennis Fung and Andrea Mazzola, two police criminal investigators, conducted their tests. The department maintained the city’s two-way radio equipment.

Arrest

Two officers of the police gang unit who happened to be inside Piper Tech on an unrelated matter arrested Woods as he tried to leave the building.

Trial

Woods was convicted Nov. 5 of first-degree murder in the deaths of Walton, Gain, and Carpenter. He was convicted of second-degree murder in the death of Wakefield.

Before sentencing, Lydia Gain, a widow of one victim, said:

“You will wish the jury had given you the death penalty,” Lydia Gain, a widow of one victim, said before the sentencing. “You will be one of the living dead.”

Sentencing

Superior Court Judge Edward Ferns ordered Woods to prison for the rest of his life. Woods was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on February 7, 1997.

Woods was described as being upset over a poor performance review and worried that he might be fired, and as seething after more than a year of bad reviews and reprimands. The record also states that on July 19, 1995, Woods pulled a 9-millimeter pistol from his toolbox and tracked down his superiors in offices and hallways at Piper Tech.

Outcome

Woods received life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Timeline

• July 19, 1995 — Woods argued about a negative performance evaluation at work at the Piper Technical Center, returned with a 19-shot Glock semiautomatic pistol, and shot and killed four supervisors in different parts of Piper Tech; he later surrendered without incident after being arrested by two police gang unit officers.
• Nov. 5, 1995 — Woods was convicted of first-degree murder for Walton, Gain, and Carpenter, and convicted of second-degree murder for Wakefield.
• February 7, 1997 — Woods was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
• February 8, 1997 — A report described that Woods received the sentence after impassioned, tearful pleas from the families of victims.

Other details

The Piper Tech facility was described as being “just east of downtown Los Angeles.” The record also characterized Woods’s killing as methodically hunting down his victims.