Woman gets prison for covering up filmmaker's murder

Associated Press/March 12, 2005

Cheyenne -- A Cheyenne woman convicted of helping cover up the murder of a Chicago filmmaker will serve 24 to 34 months in prison, a judge ruled.

Julia Williams, 51, was found guilty in November of being an accessory after the fact to murder. She plans to appeal the felony conviction, according to a court transcript.

Williams was charged in February 2003, three years after police unearthed the remains of cinematographer Allen Ross in the basement of her East 17th Street home.

Ross' mysterious disappearance motivated friends to film a documentary called "Missing Allen." One of the producers, Gaylon Emerzian, said news of Williams' sentence gave her little comfort.

"It doesn't give me closure," she said from her home in Evanston, Ill. "My thing is that it doesn't satisfy me because it seems Julia is the only one who got caught in the trap."

Williams was sentenced by District Judge Peter Arnold, who also ordered her to pay a $2,500 fine and $3,500 to the public defender's office.

The case was unusual because no one has been charged in the murder. The prime suspect, Linda Greene, died in 2002 in Arkansas from natural causes.

According to prosecutor Jon Forwood, Williams told investigators she helped bury Ross's body but maintained that Greene was innocent. She said Greene's ex-husband, Denis, killed Ross and threatened her harm if she didn't help cover it up.

But investigators cleared Mr. Greene in the murder, and all evidence pointed to Linda Greene as the shooter.

During trial, Forwood argued that while Williams didn't shoot Ross and didn't see it happen, she heard the shots fired, helped bury the 42-year-old man's body, then misled police.

Forwood contended Williams was involved in a religious fringe group called the Samaritan Foundation, led by Linda Greene. He alleged Greene shot Ross when he threatened to part ways with the group not long after Greene relocated her circle from Guthrie, Okla., to Cheyenne.

During the trial, Denis Greene testified that Linda told him in 1996 that she shot Ross, and with help from Williams, buried his body in the basement.

Police looked in the basement that year but found nothing unusual. In 2000, another search revealed a shifted grave, covered with a thin coat of cement.

Film revives interest in case

Oklahoman/May 31, 2000
By Carrie Pagley

Guthrie -- The last time Gaylon Emerzian talked to Allen Ross he seemed different. Since that time, more than four years ago, Emerzian has been wondering what happened to her friend and former co-worker.

Ross moved from Chicago to Guthrie in 1991. He joined the Samaritan Foundation, a religious cult founded in Guthrie, and met and later married Linda Greene, the self-proclaimed leader and founder of the Samaritan Foundation. Greene and Ross moved to Cheyenne, Wyo., shortly after the Murrah building bombing in 1995.

Four years ago, Ross completely disappeared. Emerzian, an independent film-maker from Chicago, and another friend of Ross's, Christian Bauer, are now working on a documentary about the details leading up to Ross's disappearance. They and their film crew will be filming part of the documentary in Guthrie this week.

Looking for answers Ross's move to Guthrie was completely unexpected, Emerzian said. Emerzian had worked with Ross, a cameraman, on and off for 15 years. She felt like she knew him well. But when he moved to Guthrie and joined a cult, all of his friends were shocked.

Now, as Emerzian and Bauer continue to dig in Ross's life in Guthrie, they are finding out some of what he was involved in. "I know an incredible amount. But I feel like the more I know, the less I know," she said. "People in the Chicago film community have been trying to figure this out for years."

Emerzian and Bauer have hired an Oklahoma City private investigators' firm -- and one in Cheyenne. The documentary and investigation have drawn attention to Ross's case again.

Cheyenne police recently reopened the case, Emerzian said. Guthrie police said the last time they had any contact with Ross was in 1995, when he was questioned in the Murrah bombing. Areas where Samaritan Foundation members lived in Guthrie have been investigated for evidence of Ross's body. Nothing was found, police said.

Emerzian sees two different scenarios for what may have happened to Ross: He was murdered or escaped the cult and is hiding out somewhere. Emerzian said there is no paper trail of Ross's whereabouts, though. His credit card has not been used and he's had no contact with anyone since he disappeared.

Samaritan Foundation The Samaritan Foundation, Linda Greene's cult, was well- known in Guthrie. Members lived in the old territorial jail, 214 W Noble, at one time and in Greene's two houses at 909 Mockingbird and 301 Second.

During a 1993 custody battle in Logan County that involved the religious cult, The Oklahoman obtained a copy of the cult's writings, which caution believers not to talk on the telephone because vampires can gain access to them.

Another describes President Clinton as an "animal-mutant zombie," first lady Hillary Clinton as a "three-virtue type zombie" and Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein as a "five-virtue zombie."

Some members reportedly believed the Universal Price Code, also called the bar code, was evil. Members sometimes put drawings under groceries to remove evil, or swung a pendulum over things to remove evil, according to reports. Linda Green is living somewhere unknown now. Emerzian believes she may be somewhere in South America.

Guthrie police said the cult consisted of mainly people from other countries. Children and families lived in the jail for a while, but the Department of Human Services shut it down in 1993, police said. >From researching some of Linda Greene's writings, there was a point when the cult began to crumble, Emerzian said.

"Linda Greene talks about her following dwindling from 350 to three," she said. The group, which was rumored to be connected to the Branch Davidians in some way, started to crumble after the bombing, Emerzian said. By the time Greene and Ross moved to Cheyenne, the group seemed to have dissipated.

But in Guthrie, while the group was strong, the cult developed a hold over followers that was difficult to break -- and still is, Emerzian said. Breaking the silence Some of those members may still live in Guthrie or around the country.

But they're not talking, Emerzian said. Those who she has tracked down won't describe what the cult was about or what happened to it. "I don't know if it's the power she has, the knowledge she has that might embarrass them ...," Emerzian said.

Emerzian said people are afraid to answer questions about the cult, but she wants to encourage people to talk to her -- she is searching for the truth about what happened to Ross.

"When I started this project, I was 90 percent sure he was hiding out somewhere," Emerzian said. Now, she's not so sure, but she needs more information. "My fondest hope is that I'll get a telephone call and it will be Allen Ross's voice saying, 'Gaylon, leave me alone.'"

Woman charged in filmmaker's death

Chicago Sun Times/February 28, 2003

More than seven years after the disappearance of Chicago filmmaker Allen Ross, police in Cheyenne, Wyo., have charged a woman who said she helped bury him.

Julia Williams, 49, was not able to finger the actual killer, said Cheyenne police Lt. Jeff Schulz. But she told police she was in an upstairs room of the house in which Ross was killed in November 1995, when she heard two gunshots and then found her best friend--Linda Greene--a cult leader and Ross' late wife--and Greene's ex-husband, Dennis Greene, with Ross' body downstairs.

Police charged Williams, who said she helped bury Ross in a crawl space under the house, with being an accessory after the fact. Williams told police she buried the murder weapon--probably a 9mm Glock--in Kansas City, Mo.

Investigators are trying to determine who pulled the trigger. They say a property rights dispute may have provided a motive.

Williams arrested as accessory to filmmaker's death

Casper Star Tribune/February 27, 2003
By Mead Gruver

Cheyenne, Wyo. -- Police arrested a woman Thursday and charged her with being an accessory to the murder of filmmaker Allen Ross in 1995.

Julia Williams, 49, is accused of helping bury Ross' body in the dirt basement of a house in downtown Cheyenne. Williams also allegedly hid the gun used to kill Ross.

Williams' arrest was the first in the murder investigation. Charged as an accessory after the fact, Williams was to appear Thursday afternoon before Laramie County Circuit Judge Robert Allen.

Ross' body was found in July 2000. An investigation concluded that he had been shot in the head and had massive skull fractures.

Ross had been missing since November 1995, seven months after he moved to Cheyenne with Williams and his common-law wife, Linda Greene, from Guthrie, Okla. The three and others belonged to a religious sect called the Samaritan Foundation.

Cheyenne Police Lt. Jeff Schulz said Williams, who left Cheyenne not long after Ross' murder, moved back to town not long after Linda Greene's death last March in Berryville, Ark.

''After the death, Ms. Williams started approaching us a little more,'' he said. ''Over a period of interviews she eventually admitted burying the body and hiding the gun.''

He said Williams was arrested without incident after she was called in to the Police Department to discuss the case.

Ross grew up in the Chicago suburb of Naperville, Ill. He was well-known in Chicago filmmaking circles before he abruptly moved to Oklahoma in the early 1990s, according to friends.

For a time he lived with other members of the Samaritan Foundation in an abandoned jailhouse in Guthrie. In April 1995, several members of the group moved to Cheyenne.

Williams, Linda Greene and Greene's husband, Denis Greene, now of Kansas City, Mo., were in the house when Ross was killed, Schulz said.

''That certainly narrows down our list of suspects,'' he said. However: ''We don't have enough evidence to prove who pulled the trigger.''

Police suspect the cult's activities played a role in the murder.

''We have hypothesized that Mr. Ross was trying to get title to some of the property or rights to some of the books or printed materials they were printing out,'' he said.

He said Linda Greene and Denis Greene have implicated each other in interviews with police.

Last fall, he said, Williams went with Cheyenne police to Kansas City to show them the lot where she disposed of the gun used to kill Ross. Much had been dumped at the lot since 1995, however, and the gun was not found.

''Since she started coming forward she's been extremely cooperative and we're counting on that continued cooperation to build a case against the suspect,'' he said. ''And if it turns out to be Linda Greene, we won't charge her ... but at least we'll know who did it.''

He said he is happy with the progress that has been made in the case.

Not guilty plea in sect slaying

Associated Press/March 25, 2003

Cheyenne, Wyo. -- A woman has pleaded not guilty to charges of being an accessory after the fact to the murder of Chicago filmmaker Allen Ross.

Julia Williams, 49, is accused of helping bury Ross' body in the dirt basement of a house in downtown Cheyenne. Williams also allegedly hid the gun used to kill Ross in 1995.

Ross' body was found in July 2000. An investigation concluded he had been shot in the head.

Williams entered her not guilty plea Monday in state District Court of Laramie County. At the hearing, public defender Diane Lozano asked Judge James Burke to reduce bond from $3,000 to $1,000 to ease the financial strain on Williams, who had charged the full amount to her credit card.

District Attorney Jon Forwood opposed the motion and Burke agreed, leaving bond at $3,000.

If convicted, Williams could face up to three years in prison and a fine up to $3,000. Trial is set for July 22.

Before his body was found in 2000, Ross had been missing since November 1995, seven months after he moved to Cheyenne with Williams and his common-law wife, Linda Greene, from Guthrie, Okla. The three and others belonged to a religious sect called the Samaritan Foundation.

Williams left Cheyenne not long after Ross' murder, then moved back to town after Greene's death from natural causes a year ago in Berryville, Ark. Williams started approaching police with information about the case and allegedly told officers she buried the body and hid the gun.

Ross, 42, grew up in the Chicago suburb of Naperville, Ill. He was well-known in Chicago filmmaking circles before he abruptly moved to Oklahoma in the early 1990s, according to friends.

Williams, Linda Greene and Greene's husband, Denis Greene, now of Kansas City, Mo., were in the house when Ross was killed, police said. However, investigators say they don't have enough evidence to prove who pulled the trigger.

The Greenes had implicated each other in interviews, police have said.

Detectives theorize that Ross was killed because he was trying to gain rights to some of the materials the cult was printing.