State seeks death penalty against man accused of murder in death of 14-year-old Ryan Rogers

WEST PALM BEACH — Prosecutors told the Circuit Court late Friday that they intend to seek the death penalty against the man accused in the November death of a Palm Beach Gardens teen, according to Palm Beach County court records.

An entry posted on the Clerk of Court's website Friday evening indicated that the Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office wants the penalty in play during the court proceeding against Semmie Williams Jr.

Palm Beach Gardens police arrested Williams, 39, in Miami on Dec. 1 in the Nov. 15 death of 14-year-old Ryan Rogers, whose body was found the next morning on Central Boulevard near the Interstate 95 overpass.

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The clerk's office did not post the filing online late Friday, and no other details were immediately available. The State Attorney's Office declined to comment about the filing.

The Palm Beach County Public Defender's Office is representing Williams. As a policy, it does not comment on open cases.

The state can withdraw its request to seek the death penalty as Williams' case winds toward trial. It has done so in other high-profile murder cases, such as that of Sheila Keen-Warren, who is facing a first-degree murder charge in the Wellington "clown killer" case.

It has taken its death-penalty request to trial on other occasions, most notably the case of Marlin Joseph, who in November 2021 became the first person to be sentenced to death in a Palm Beach County court in 18 years. A jury had convicted Joseph of killing a mother and her daughter in West Palm Beach in December 2017.

It sought the death penalty against Christopher Vasata in May 2019 for his role in a February 2017 Jupiter triple homicide. A jury instead sentenced Vasata to life in prison.

The state of Williams' mental health is expected to be an issue during his court proceeding. Circuit Judge Kirk Volker, who will preside over the case, in placing limits on the release of evidence to the public noted that Williams has a history of mental illness.

Defense attorney Michael Salnick, who is not involved in Williams' case, said Monday that questions regarding a defendant's mental competency would have to be addressed before the case could proceed to trial. Both sides can hire their own experts to evaluate a person's mental state.

The issue of competency addresses a defendant's ability to assist his or her attorney by relating facts and describing meaningful events, he said.

"If the client is incompetent to do that, then you can't even go forward," Salnick said. "So what needs to be done initially is a competency evaluation."

Salnick noted that mental competency and insanity are separate issues, emphasizing that a person can be deemed competent while still meeting the legal standard for insanity.

"The first issue is whether someone's competent," he said. "They're not going to use the death penalty for someone who is incompetent. They're not even going to proceed with a trial if someone is incompetent. It's essentially a non-issue until the person is competent."

A bill introduced in the Florida Senate in 2021 would have barred the state from seeking a death sentence for those with severe mental illnesses if attorneys could prove the person was ill at the time of the offense. The chamber's judiciary committee did not move the bill to the full Senate.

Rogers was a freshman at William T. Dwyer High School in Palm Beach Gardens. He was reported missing on the evening of Nov. 15 when he failed to return home after leaving to go for a ride on his bicycle.

Investigators found his body at about 9 a.m. the next morning. Palm Beach Gardens police announced days later that his death was a homicide.

Williams appeared in court Friday on a separate charge of corruption by threat against a public official. Investigators say Williams made threats against a deputy as he was being processed at the Palm Beach County Jail following his arrest in connection to Rogers' death.

During Friday's hearing, Circuit Judge Daliah Weiss set Williams' bail at $5,000 and scheduled his next hearing for February. Williams is being held without bail on the murder charge.

jwhigham@pbpost.com

@JuliusWhigham

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Ryan Rogers: Prosecutors seek death penalty against Semmie Williams