Looking back at lifetime on court
A standout basketball player in high school, Kingston native Donald A. Williams spent his adult career as an Ulster County prosecutor and as a county judge.
For the past 10 years, Ulster County Judge Donald A. Williams was the man who decided the fate of every criminal convicted of a felony in Ulster County.
It was Williams upon whom crime victims and society at large relied to deliver justice, and it was Williams upon whom criminal defendants, often charged with the most heinous acts, relied to ensure their right to a fair trial — and to show mercy at sentencing.
Convicted criminals didn’t often see mercy from Williams, especially those convicted of violent crimes or those that involved gangs or weapons.
Even so, Williams said, he has always taken pride in ensuring that even those charged with the worst crimes imaginable received the fairest of trials, and he has a stack of letters written
by those he has sentenced thanking him for doing just that.
As he prepares to hang up his robes for the last time on Tuesday, Dec. 31, Williams, a Kingston native and former Ulster County prosecutor, sat down with the Freeman to reflect on his 40-year career in the criminal justice system, including a decadelong stint on the bench.
Williams was born in the city of Kingston, growing up on Crown Street — or, as he likes to say, in the shadow of the Ulster County Courthouse.
In his youth, Williams recalled with a laugh, he had his sights set on becoming a professional basketball player. But at 5-feet, 8-inches tall, that career was not in the cards for him, so he had to consider a different path.
He majored in history and philosophy in college, but always felt drawn to something else.
Maybe it was the fact that he always wanted to hear “both sides” of an issue before making a decision. Or being so close to the courthouse on Wall Street Uptown, passing it every day and understanding the weighty and important work that was being done inside.
“Perhaps I was directed toward this,” he said. “I don’t know. I can’t recall.”
After graduating from Seton Hall University in 1975, he headed to Albany Law School, where he received his law degree in 1979.
Williams was hired fresh out of law school by then-Ulster County District Attorney Michael Kavanagh. After serving 16 years as chief assistant district attorney, he was appointed Ulster County district attorney in February 1999, when Kavanagh was elected to the state Supreme Court.
The following November, Williams was elected district attorney, serving in that position until 2007.
After a brief stint working in private practice with David Clegg (who was elected Ulster County district attorney over Kavanagh’s son, Michael, in November, pending a ballot recount), Williams was elected in 2009 as Ulster County’s sole county judge, charged with presiding over all felony cases in the county.
The court handles about 300 felony cases each year, meaning that in the course of his 10 years on the bench, Willams has presided over some 3,000 criminal cases. Most are resolved as a result of a plea bargain, although Williams concedes he finds plea bargains “distasteful.” Even with plea agreements, he has one of the busiest trial calendars in the region.
Williams said it’s been the most difficult and fulfilling career he could imagine.
“This is what I feel I was put here for,” he said. “This is where I think I can do the most good.
“I’ve been blessed to be a small hometown boy without connections to be district attorney and then a judge in a field I think has been my purpose,” he said.
Williams knows that over the years he has developed a reputation for being a tough-as-nails judge who has little patience for attorney missteps and even less patience for those convicted criminals he believes are harming his beloved community.
Defense lawyers often warn their clients that it could be to their peril to try to offer any statements at sentencing; Williams will frequently challenge a defendant’s statements and has been known to demand that a defendant be sworn in so that his answers will be under oath, then peppering him with questions and forcing him to explain himself and his answers.
He does that, he said, to test the sincerity of the defendant and to determine if he or she is worthy of a lighter sentence.
“I don’t get to talk to these people; I have to figure out in a very short time whether they are sincerely remorseful and worthy of compassion,” he said.
For those who don’t appear remorseful or for those who commit violent crimes, or are involved in gang activity or weapons, Williams has no compassion and he lets that be known from the bench, oftentimes telling a defendant, “You are deserving of no sympathy, no pity, no consideration ... . ”
His harsh remarks from the bench, he said, are as much meant for the community as they are for the person being sentenced.
“I’m vested in this community. I was born and raised in this community. I answer to this community as a matter of principle,” he said. “It’s not about punishment. Punishment is on the bottom end.
“It’s about deterrence. It’s about trying to have the community I was born and raised in be a good, safe community.”
He admits, though, that he was unprepared for how difficult it would be to hand down a sentence, and concedes that there have been times that he’s lost sleep over the prospect of sending someone to state prison for a long time.
“When you’re the last step in the process and you’re the one that is actually sending another human being away for long periods of time, it can be more troubling sleeping at night the night before a sentencing than it is (as an assistant district attorney) recommending it,” he said. “That left an impression on me from the first day I took the bench. That has left a lasting impression on me.”
He said it finds it fulfilling when victims or their families thank him for handing down tough sentences against the person who committed a violent crime against them or a loved one.
“To have them nod to me and thank me, for me there is no better feeling,” Williams said.
A close second though is when a defendant thanks him for making sure he got a fair trial — even if he was convicted.
One of the most surprising examples of that, he said, came from Jarrin Rankin, the man who from behind bars at the Ulster County Jail orchestrated the 2010 gangland slaying of Charles “C.J.” King.
“After I sentenced him to the maximum sentence I could, he said, ‘You promised me you’d give me a fair trial and you did,’” Williams recalled.
“I pride myself on that and I’m fulfilled when I hear these statements made,” he said.
Williams said he has also received letters from drug addicts who tell him that they used the time they spent in jail to kick their drug habit and turn their lives around. While he said he doesn’t need or even want people to heap thanks upon him, he keeps the letters “because they mean a great deal to me.”
Williams said he wasn’t necessarily ready to leave the bench, but health issues, his age (at 67 he would only be able to serve 3 years of another 10-year term), political considerations, and the words of his daughter, Jordyn, who told him, “Mom and I think you’ve done enough,” prompted him not to run for a second term. (Williams’ wife, Ann, died on Nov. 24, 2016).
He admits he has no real plans for the future, but he knows he going to take more than one week of vacation.
Since taking the bench, Williams has only taken one week of vacation each year, and he said he may go down to Florida with friend and law clerk John Prizzia to take in some baseball games during spring training.
For now, though, he just wants to know what it’s like to be an everyday citizen.
“I want to know what it’s like to not constantly be concerned about victims, defendants and a community,” he said. “I want to know what it’s like to be a regular person without having the weight of the world on my shoulders.”