Judge calls mistrial in Susan Williams case

A long year got a little longer last week for former Rockville Centre resident Susan Williams, the 43-year-old mother of four who allegedly hired a hit man last February to kill her estranged husband.

Last Friday, just three days after the start of her trial in criminal court in Mineola, Judge Norman St. George declared a mistrial after learning that Williams’s defense attorney, John Carman, had mistakenly signed a stipulation that allowed the prosecution to play for the jury an incriminating recording of a jailhouse phone conversation between Williams and her oldest daughter, Alexis. The recording suggested evidence-tampering and foul play.

Carman told the judge that he did not mean to sign the form, and admitted that he thought he was only agreeing to the tape’s authenticity. “Mistakes can be made,” said Carman.

On the recording, Williams’s daughter can be heard telling her mother that she removed certain items from her Garden City house, including credit cards and a $1 million life insurance policy that Williams is accused of forging. “I got everything,” Alexis says to her mother.

Last February, Williams allegedly offered to pay an undercover police officer disguised as a hit man $20,000 to kill her ex-husband, Peter Williams. She was charged with conspiracy, two counts of criminal solicitation and criminal possession of a forged instrument, and faces up to 25 years in prison if she is convicted.

When opening statements were presented to the jury last week, Nassau County Prosecutor Anne Donnelly outlined the charges and described Williams, who now appears noticeably grayer than she was in the mug shot at the time of her arrest, as a selfish and conniving person. “Susan Williams is definitely out for herself,” Donnelly said. “The real person is cold, and this case is about greed, power, money and ultimately Susan Williams herself.”

Donnelly also said during her opening statement that on Feb. 19, Williams met undercover officer Joseph LaBella, who was posing as a hit man at the Carle Place Diner. During the encounter, Williams expressed her desire to have her husband killed.

“I was shocked and taken aback,” LaBella told the prosecution during his testimony last week. “She told me that she wanted her husband to disappear, and it was all difficult for me to digest. I lost sleep for three days.”

On Feb. 23, when the two spoke again, they finalized a plan to kill Peter. On an audiotape that was played on Oct. 29, Williams could be heard saying to LaBella that she felt confident going ahead with the murder plan, and LaBella assured her that he would make the arrangements.

Peter Williams also took the stand last week and gave a revealing testimony. He told the jury that his marriage to Susan deteriorated once he discovered that she had slept with her boss and with his brother, Robert. Peter also testified that he wanted to split the divorce in half with Susan but she refused, telling him, “Wait and see what I do to you.”

In his defense, Carman has attempted to pin the blame on LaBella, whom he referred to as a “master manipulator” at a time when Susan Williams was battling cancer and dealing with the collapse of her marriage.

“Williams is not a violent person,” Carman argued. “In February 2010, every facet of her life was in shambles. She was very vulnerable, and LaBella knew it. If it weren’t for him, Susan Williams wouldn’t be sitting in a courtroom.”

Jury selection for the second trial began on Monday morning, and testimony was expected to begin later this week.

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