Aaron Michael Williams, a 22-year-old White/Caucasian male, died on August 11, 2016, after a shooting connected to a dispute in the Stanaford area near Beckley, West Virginia. Williams was from Stanaford and had been born in Beckley. He worked as a boiler operator for Allegheny Wood Products, and his obituary described someone deeply devoted to his family who especially enjoyed riding his dirt bike and fishing. He had three children.
What began as a personal dispute that Thursday ultimately ended with Williams suffering a fatal gunshot wound and being taken to Appalachian Regional Hospital in Beckley, where he died from his injuries.
According to the criminal complaint described in subsequent reporting, Joseph Michael Reid was involved with Williams’ wife at the time. Investigators said Reid and Williams’ wife arrived at her home on August 11 and found Williams there with two of the children. Reid, the woman, and the children then left together in a vehicle. Williams followed them, and the situation continued onto Stanaford Road, where an altercation developed. Authorities alleged that Williams attempted to get the children out of Reid’s vehicle. During that confrontation, deputies said Reid shot Williams. Other people who were with Williams transported him to the hospital, but the injury proved fatal.
The investigation quickly focused on Reid. Raleigh County sheriff’s deputies located him on Vine Street in Beckley after the shooting and arrested him on a murder charge. He was taken into custody and held at the Southern Regional Jail. Contemporary law-enforcement reporting characterized the shooting as arising from the dispute between Reid and Williams, while the later account of the criminal complaint provided the fuller sequence involving Williams’ wife, the children, the vehicles, and the confrontation on Stanaford Road.
The criminal case advanced beyond the initial arrest. In May 2017, a Raleigh County grand jury returned a nine-count indictment against Reid. The indictment included one count of first-degree murder, one count involving use of a firearm, six counts of wanton endangerment, and one count of gross child neglect with risk of serious bodily injury. Prosecutors continued to accuse Reid of being the person who shot Williams during the Stanaford Road confrontation. The additional charges indicated that the prosecution was addressing not only the fatal shooting but also alleged dangers created for others during the incident, including concerns involving children who were present.
Publicly accessible reporting located for the case establishes Reid’s arrest on the murder charge and his subsequent indictment on first-degree murder and eight additional counts. The available reliable online reports reviewed do not establish a later plea agreement, trial verdict, conviction, acquittal, dismissal, or sentence, so no such outcome can be stated with confidence. The documented case history therefore ends, in the accessible reporting located, with Joseph Michael Reid formally indicted and facing prosecution for Williams’ killing and the related offenses.
