Convicted former Purdue player sentenced to 37 years

WEST LAFAYETTE – A former Purdue linebacker has been sentenced to 37 years in prison for attacking two women on campus.\nKyle Darnell Williams, 21, of Bolingbrook, Ill., is still awaiting trial in Illinois for a third attack.\nHe was sentenced Thursday on one count of attempted rape and two counts each of battery and confinement. A jury convicted him in April.\n“The elements of the attacks are so similar that it appears to be ritualistic in some way,” Judge Thomas Busch of Tippecanoe Superior Court 2 said.\nWilliams wore similar homemade masks in both Nov. 29, 2005 incidents and attacked the victims from behind, according to court records.\nWhile Williams was free on bond awaiting trial, DuPage County, Ill., authorities say he carried out a similar attack on another woman in a parking garage there. He still is awaiting trial on those charges.\nHe also pleaded guilty Thursday to charges he broke into a teammate’s dorm room 19 days before the attacks and stole his laptop computer.\nWilliams’ father, Steve Williams, said the crimes were “totally out of character” for his son, who apologized for the attacks in court Thursday.\nKyle Williams had suffered two concussions during the previous football season and Purdue officials said he had been released from the team at his own request days before the attacks.\nHis father attributed Williams’ behavior to the brain injuries.\nHowever, his son’s attorneys did not raise the injuries as a defense. Attorney Kent Moore said the brain injuries did not rise to the level of a legal defense but the best explanation was that “something organic happened to him.”\nBut Busch discounted Williams’ claims that the attacks were out of character.\n“There’s clearly a strong element of denial, of evasion, of dishonesty in these statements,” Busch said. “I think you need to come to terms with your own mind and try to find out how this happened.”\nWilliams was one of the nation’s top high school prospects as a senior and was named a first team All-American by Parade, Rivals.com and Insiders.com, according to the Purdue 2005 football media guide.