A woman testified at a preliminary hearing in June in an Oakland courtroom that she drove the suspected killer of 29-year-old Darnesha Williams away from the scene of a gas station shooting, telling the court that the suspect confessed to the crime right there in her truck. The testimony came in the case against Lanae Adams, who faces murder charges in connection with Williams’s death outside the Kwik Serve station on East 12th Avenue in January 2025.
According to the East Bay Times, the witness testified under a grant of immunity that she had been parked in a pickup truck at the Kwik Serve with her daughter when Adams approached after the shooting and asked for a ride. The witness said Adams appeared distraught and, while being driven away, confessed to the homicide. The woman also testified that she was addicted to drugs, living on the streets at the time, and had a pending fraud case out of San Mateo — and that she hoped police would help her get into drug rehabilitation, though they did not. She said she and Adams were both living difficult lives around the time of the killing, and that her own legal troubles since then had pushed her to turn her life around.
Williams was shot on January 2, 2025, at the Kwik Serve in the 2200 block of East 12th Avenue, according to Mercury News. Police said Williams had pulled up to the station in a stolen Audi and was shot while trying to drive away, in a shooting that occurred roughly five minutes before midnight. She was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead the next day. Investigators have described the shooting as targeted but have not disclosed a motive, and neither authorities nor the alleged getaway driver discussed the alleged motive.
How Investigators Say They Identified Adams
Police said Adams arrived at the gas station with another person shortly before the shooting, and that surveillance video captured her shooting Williams in the head just minutes after arriving. Investigators reviewed that footage and said they recognized distinctive tattoos on the suspect, later matching them to photos on Adams’s Facebook and Instagram pages to make a positive identification, the outlet’s report noted. Police say Adams then approached the pickup truck where the witness and her daughter were parked, got a ride, and left the scene in that vehicle…