WACO (August 28, 2012)-Two men were in the McLennan County Jail Tuesday, one charged with murder and the other as a material witness to the 1998 killing.
James Earl Williams, 45, was ordered held in lieu of $1 million bond, charged with murder.
Terrance Lamar Johnson, 34, was held in lieu of bonds totaling $20,000 as a material witness to the murder and on a charge of aggravated robbery in an unrelated incident.
Both men also were held on a federal detainer without bond.
In an indictment returned on March 28, Williams was named in connection with the June 12, 1998 murder of Darren Eugene Lang, 17.
After Lang was wounded in a drive-by shooting on June 12, 1998, he drove from the shooting scene to the Waco Police Department at North 4th Street and West Waco Drive and died at the building’s back door, Waco police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said Tuesday.
McLennan County Assistant District Attorney Michael Jarrett said at the time of the indictment that the Lang murder file was found stored in a DA's office filing cabinet and the case was reopened this past spring.
A Waco police detective had identified Williams in 1998 as the suspected gunman after several witnesses gave police his name.
Why the file was stored and what happened to it in the intervening years is unknown, Jarrett said.
Williams was transferred to Waco Monday from the federal detention center at Big Spring where he’s serving time after he was convicted for distribution of cocaine.
Johnson was arrested by McLennan County sheriff's deputies and booked Monday, jail records indicate.
