On October 4, 1999, 24-year-old Michael Greenwood, a delivery driver from the Springfield, Missouri area, was killed in a violent collision while working his route in Urbana, Missouri. A Culligan water truck driver, Greenwood was in the process of making a delivery turn when his vehicle was struck by a pickup truck fleeing law enforcement at speeds reaching 120 miles per hour. The force of the impact was catastrophic, ejecting Greenwood from his vehicle and killing him instantly.
He left behind a wife, who was pregnant with twin boys at the time, and a five-year-old daughter.
The driver of the fleeing vehicle was Kenneth Dewayne Williams, a 20-year-old convicted murderer who had escaped from the Cummins Unit maximum-security prison in Arkansas just the day before. Williams had made his escape by hiding in a 500-gallon tank of hog slop being transported out of the facility. Following his escape, he made his way to a nearby home belonging to Cecil Boren, a 57-year-old former prison warden. Williams shot and killed Boren, dragged his body into the house, and stole Boren's truck, firearms, and clothing before fleeing north toward Missouri.
Law enforcement officers in Lebanon, Missouri, spotted the stolen vehicle the following day and attempted a traffic stop, initiating a high-speed chase that spanned approximately 60 miles. The pursuit ended tragically in Urbana when Williams lost control and slammed into Greenwood’s delivery truck. Following the crash, Williams attempted to flee on foot but was quickly apprehended by authorities. Reports from the scene indicated that upon his arrest, Williams mocked the victim, spitting on Greenwood's body and blaming him for the failed escape.
Kenneth Williams was returned to Arkansas, where he faced capital murder charges for the death of Cecil Boren. While he was not separately prosecuted for Michael Greenwood’s death, the incident was used as an aggravating factor during his trial. Williams was already serving a life sentence for the 1998 murder of a university cheerleader, Dominique Hurd, at the time of his escape. He was ultimately convicted of Boren's murder and sentenced to death. During his incarceration on death row, he confessed to a fourth murder, acknowledging his role in another killing from 1998.
Williams was executed by lethal injection on April 27, 2017. In a remarkable turn of events leading up to the execution, Michael Greenwood’s family extended forgiveness to the killer. Greenwood’s daughter and widow learned that Williams had an estranged daughter and a granddaughter he had never met residing in Washington state. The Greenwood family purchased plane tickets for them, allowing the inmates' family to visit him in prison just days before his death. Williams expressed deep remorse in his final statement, and the Greenwood family requested that his life be spared, though the execution proceeded as scheduled.
