‘I tried to get up but my legs weren’t working:’ Trial begins in deadly Greyhound bus shooting
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — A Greyhound bus traveling over the Grapevine early Feb. 3, 2020, carried more than 40 people. Some were on vacation, some were heading home, still others were on their way to college.
Their plans were different, but a prosecutor said all had one thing in common: They had nowhere to run or hide when passenger Anthony Devonte Williams stood, swore and started spraying bullets.
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Sixteen shots later, a woman was dying and five others wounded.
One of the victims, Claudia Alvarez, was hit in the chest as she slept. Her legs went numb.
“I tried to get up but my legs weren’t working,” she said Tuesday, the first day of Williams’ trial on charges of murder and six counts of attempted murder.
The remaining passengers, while physically unharmed, were impacted emotionally and mentally, prosecutor Stephanie Taconi said during her opening statement.
“None were expecting that their lives would be forever changed because of an angry man on a bus with a gun,” Taconi said.
Williams, 37, faces life in prison if convicted. He has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. The trial is expected to last at least a week.
Deputy Public Defender Nick Roth said he and co-counsel Samantha Sark don’t dispute the physical evidence. It’s clear Williams was the shooter.
But charges of murder and attempted murder require an intent to kill. The evidence, Roth said, will show Williams didn’t plan the shooting, and fired at random. No one antagonized him.
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Earlier on the bus ride, Williams had exhibited strange behavior, talking to himself, Roth said.
While acknowledging Williams is guilty of serious crimes, Roth said his mental state at the time of the incident needs to be taken into account when deciding what he should be convicted of.
According to court documents, Williams admitted bringing a gun onto the bus headed from Los Angeles to Oakland. He told investigators he began shooting after arguing with a man as they traveled north on Interstate 5, south of Fort Tejon Road.
The man he argued with wasn’t hit. Lurbis Elena Vence, 51, wasn’t so lucky. Hit multiple times, she was pronounced dead at the scene.
After Williams emptied the handgun’s clip, a passenger wrestled with him over the weapon. It fell, and Williams ran to the front of the bus. The driver stopped and Williams got off. He was picked up by law enforcement as he walked along the highway.
Meanwhile, the bus rushed to the next exit and stopped in a parking lot as emergency responders arrived.
Alvarez, the second witness called to testify, entered the courtroom in a wheelchair. She said the bullet that pierced her body left her with a spinal cord injury. She’ll never walk again.
Upon boarding the bus in Los Angeles the evening of Feb. 2, Alvarez found a seat and talked to the woman sitting next to her.
She felt comfortable enough with her surroundings to relax as the bus began its overnight trip.
Alvarez drifted off to sleep. She woke to pain.
“I couldn’t feel my legs anymore,” she said. “It’s like a feeling where your body parts fall asleep.”
Alvarez was taken to a hospital. Later she received the grim news: she was paralyzed.
With no use of her lower extremities, and experiencing chronic pain, Alvarez left school. She now relies on her family for help with even simple tasks.
Speaking through tears, Alvarez said, “It’s a lot of grief for the person that I was, and the future I had envisioned for myself.”
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