GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — In the days after the murder of 66-year-old Willie Jones in March 2000 by four teenagers outside a Grand Rapids bowling alley, close friends spoke tearfully about their loss.
“I didn’t want to believe it,” a former bowling teammate said. “It just couldn’t happen. Not to Willie.”
“We’re going to miss him,” a former GM factory co-worker said. “Everybody that knew him loved him.”
Twenty-five years later, on Monday, one of the killers was back in court to get his sentence reduced. But there was no one there to speak for Jones…