Charges cap long rap sheet

U.S. attorney calls Clark 'a danger to the community'

By John C. Ensslin, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published October 9, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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Wednesday's indictment of Willie D. Clark caps a long criminal history that ranges from an arrest in a BB-gun fight at age 12 to charges that he shot and killed Denver Bronco Darrent Williams after a New Year's Day 2007 clash in a Denver nightclub.

Along the way, investigators say, Clark, 25, became a member of a gang called the "Elite Eight" whose members are suspected in 11 unsolved homicides as well as drive-by shootings, drug robberies and home invasions.

Investigators have said that Clark started as a drug runner for the gang, which is believed to have moved hundreds of kilograms of drugs through Denver. Eventually, he began cooking his own crack cocaine and began selling it to his own customers, authorities allege.

In July 2007, during a detention hearing, a federal prosecutor toted up that criminal career by the numbers: two Social Security numbers, three Colorado driver's licenses, four dates of birth, seven aliases and 24 parole or probation revocations.

When he was arrested five days after the Williams shooting on a parole violation, he was carrying $7,238, although state income tax officials say he has no record of employment in his lifetime.

"He's a danger to the community," is how Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie Podalak described Clark.

Clark painted a different portrait of himself in a letter he sent to the Rocky in October 2007.

"I do not condone black-on- black violence or gang violence," he wrote in one of three letters sent to the paper. "I'm no saint but I damn sure ain't no member of no gang, drug dealer and most importantly I'm no murderer."

Wednesday's indictment indicates otherwise, and Clark's letter writing may have helped investigators bring those charges.

Clark admitted signing a letter in which he says he fired the shots that killed Williams by firing shots into a limousine that was carrying the Bronco and others away from a nightclub.

Members of Clark's family declined to discuss the latest charges against him.

The case against Willie D. Clark

* Witnesses saw Clark argue with Darrent Williams' friends inside and outside a Denver nightclub.

* Surveillance videos captured Clark and his associates outside the club just before the shooting.

* A witness says he or she heard Clark ask someone for a gun.

* Someone inside an SUV with Clark told police Clark fired at the limo.

* Clark told a detective he wrote a letter admitting he fired the shot that killed Williams.

* In letters to the Rocky Mountain News, however, Clark, 25, has repeatedly said he was not involved in the killing.

In the most recent letter, sent in August, Clark said he "tired of going through the B.S." of being questioned by homicide detectives.

"I don't know nothing and I've done none of what they claim," he wrote.

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