4 Arrested in Hired Killing of L.A. Officer

Four Los Angeles men have been arrested in the alleged $10,000 contract killing of an off-duty Los Angeles police detective who was slain last week in apparent “vengeance” for his testimony hours earlier in the armed robbery trial of one of the suspects, police said Tuesday.

The mastermind of the alleged murder-for-hire plot was the robbery defendant, Daniel Steven Jenkins, Police Chief Daryl F. Gates asserted in announcing the arrests.

Jenkins initially sought to have North Hollywood Division Detective Thomas C. Williams killed on Oct. 25, the day the trial started, to prevent him from testifying against him, Gates alleged. But the hired assassin backed out at the last minute and Williams took the witness stand six days later.

Seeking revenge, Jenkins, continued to press for the killing, Gates told reporters at Parker Center about an hour after the funeral for Williams.

Jenkins, 30, had been free on $16,000 bail until he was convicted of the robbery on Friday, the day after Williams testified and was subsequently ambushed outside a Canoga Park church school.

Calling the slaying “a crime against all the people of the city of Los Angeles,” Gates alleged that Jenkins offered to pay the detective’s killer $10,000. But, he added, “We don’t know whether any money changed hands.”

“If Detective Williams had been assassinated on the 25th as intended, it certainly would have caused the trial to be continued or caused a mistrial,” Gates said. “But to strike on the 31st, after the detective had testified all day, had to be vengeance.”

“Two persons had been talked with and hired to assassinate him on that same day (the 25th) at that same location,” Gates said. “Their plan fell through. . . . We really don’t know why that didn’t occur. The individual hired as a hit man couldn’t go through with it.”

Although the three other suspects were taken into custody on Saturday, police withheld announcing their arrests until after Williams was buried.

3 Others Identified

Gates identified the three as Duane Moody, 27; Voltaire Williams, 22, and Rubin Antonio (Tony) Moss, 24, all of Los Angeles.

Jenkins remains in the Los Angeles Central Jail pending sentencing Nov. 27. He and the other jailed suspects were booked on suspicion of conspiracy to commit murder, Gates said. The chief would not disclose which of the four suspects allegedly pulled the trigger.

Police expect to present the case to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office today, Gates said, adding that investigators will ask that charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder be filed.

Police spokesman Cmdr. William Booth said the decision to seek a determination of special circumstances, which could result in the death penalty upon conviction, will be up to the prosecutor’s office. The killing of a police officer is a factor in such cases, Booth added.

Williams was gunned down from a passing car driven by a man wearing a ski mask as Williams picked up his 6-year-old son, Ryan, from school. The detective’s last words were to tell his son to duck out of the line of fire. The boy complied and escaped injury.

Hours earlier, Williams had testified for the prosecution in San Fernando Superior Court, where Jenkins was on trial on robbery and assault charges in the October, 1984, holdup of the manager of a North Hollywood theater. The robbery victim, George Carpenter, supplied the license number of the getaway car, which was traced to Jenkins.

Last July 4, in a crime that has never been solved, Carpenter was shot and critically wounded at a North Hollywood bar. Carpenter survived the shooting, changed his name and moved out of state. But he returned to testify at Jenkins’ robbery trial, police said.

Sentenced to Jail

Court records show that in 1979, Jenkins pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon after he shot and wounded a man whose son had filed a police report. He was sentenced to one year in the County Jail and three years’ probation.

Gates was asked Tuesday about reports that the four suspects in the Williams slaying were gang members.

“They’re cold-blooded killers,” the chief asserted in his response. “Whether they’re involved in a gang, I don’t know and I don’t care.”

Gates said the case was solved with the help of an informant, one of “many, many cooperative witnesses” who came forward as a result of extensive publicity.

The Police Protective League posted a $15,000 reward on Monday for the arrest of Williams’ killer. But Booth said Tuesday that he did not know if anyone is in line for the money.

The original description of Williams’ killer indicated that he was Caucasian or Latino, but detectives believe that the gunman used makeup to lighten his complexion, Gates said. He noted that all four suspects are black.

On Tuesday morning, police recovered a fully automatic “Mack-Ten” machine pistol, which Gates said was the murder weapon. It is illegal to possess such a weapon. The light-colored Chevrolet sedan believed used in the shooting has not been found, the chief said.

According to court records, suspect Moody has an extensive background of arrests, including a conviction for assault with a deadly weapon and armed robbery. They also show that Moody was convicted in 1984 on a misdemeanor violation after he tried to purchase more than $800 worth of clothes with a credit card stolen from Kerry Gordy, son of Motown Records president Berry Gordy.

Moss’ father, Roy L. Moss, a 62-year-old accountant who lives with his son in a home near Exposition Boulevard, said his son was arrested only because he testified as a defense witness in Jenkins’ robbery trial last week.

The senior Moss said his 5-feet, 10-inch, 285-pound son, a former football player at Dorsey High School, had not been previously arrested for anything more than traffic tickets.

The father said he warned his son about associating with Jenkins, who, he said, owned a limousine service called Sir Dan’s Limousine Service, which employed the younger Moss.

No further information was available on Williams.

1,500 at Funeral

Wearing black bands of mourning across their police badges, more than 1,000 law enforcement officers from around the state joined about 500 of Williams’ family members and friends, filling Our Lady of the Valley Catholic Church in Canoga Park for Williams’ funeral.

“Here was a man who was brave enough to make confrontation with evil his life’s work,” Father John Murray told the mourners. “Tom Williams, even in his death, upholds for us the line between anarchy and civilization. . . . Thank God for men and women like Tom Williams who are in the front line of that struggle.”

Accompanied by a lengthy police motorcade, Williams’ body was taken to San Fernando Mission Cemetery for burial. His wife, son and 17-year-old daughter, Susie, were presented with the American flag that covered the slain detective’s coffin.

During his news conference Tuesday, Gates said he had made a video tape Monday that is being shown to the city’s police officers.

In it, he warns:

“When you go home and leave the job, always think about security. That is not the way to enjoy life, but we have to be aware that these tragedies can happen. Be aware. Don’t be paranoid, but be aware.”

Times staff writers Bob Baker, Janet Rae-Dupree, Michael Seiler and Mark Igler contributed to this article.