The long awaited murder trial of Stephen W. Williams concluded last Friday with Williams being found guilty of murder and receiving a jury recommended life sentence without the possibility of parole for 25 years for the 2006 murder of Paul Montgomery of just north of the Bryan community.

The week long trial at the Russell County Judicial Center concluded with Williams also being recommended a 15-year sentence for first degree burglary and five years for tampering with physical evidence, the recommended sentences to run consecutively.

The four day trial, the court not meeting on Tuesday, concluded late Friday afternoon when the jury, comprised of seven women and five men, came back from an approximate two hour deliberation with their verdict.

Williams showed no visible reaction to the verdict or the subsequent recommended sentence.

Williams will formally be sentenced on March 11 before Circuit Judge Vernon Miniard, Jr.

Danny Hill of the Bryan Community was found guilty in an early 2013 jury trial of facilitation to commit murder and tampering with physical evidence for his role in the Montgomery murder, for which he received a 10-year prison sentence.

According to trial testimony, during the early hours of December 13, 2006, Williams and Hill drove from Williams’ residence off North U.S. 127 in Russell Springs to Montgomery’s home on KY 1058 near Bryan.

The two entered the home armed with sawed off shotguns and after a short argument Williams shot Montgomery in the chest at close range while Montgomery was sitting on the couch.

The two then fled the scene and hid the murder weapon.

Investigation into the murder continued until developments in 2009 led investigating officer Lieutenant Eric Wolford of the Kentucky State Police to recover the murder weapon which was hidden near Hill’s home on Helm Lane in Bryan.

The case remains the only cold investigation ever solved in Russell County, according to Wolford. A “cold case” is a case in which there are no more active leads to follow up on. The case remained unsolved until April of 2010 when Williams and Hill were indicted.

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Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul and Congressman Hal Rogers and Ed Whitfield contacted the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service a week ago Monday regarding a “matter of great concern to the economic wellbeing of the Lake Cumberland area in southeastern Kentucky.”

The members wrote, in a letter to Lt. Col. John L. Hudson, Division Commanding General of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and the Honorable Daniel M. Ashe, Director of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, that “the repair of the Wolf Creek Dam began in 2007 and has led to extremely low water levels that have damaged the area’s ability to attract tourists. The past seven years of reduced water levels have not only hurt small businesses that rely on tourism, but have also strained local governments as local towns had to lower their water intake.

“Despite all of these serious economic concerns, on January 29, 2014, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced its intent to further delay the raising of the water levels on Lake Cumberland. The Corps announced this was due to the presence of an endangered species of fish, the Duskytail Darter, in the lake’s tributaries, which requires the agencies to undertake a Biological Assessment designed to ‘minimize any potential impacts to this species.’

“We urge your agencies to immediately collaborate…in a manner that would allow for restoring the higher water levels on which the local community relies. It is critical that Lake Cumberland be able to raise water levels adequate to support tourism prior to the peak season in 2014. It is well past time for the lake to return to its full capacity.”

Furthermore, McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor a week ago Tuesday morning:

“Mr. President, over the past several years I have often come to the floor of this United States Senate to draw attention to the Obama Administration’s radical environmental agenda, and the deeply harmful effects it is having on the people of Kentucky. The Environmental Protection Agency’s War on Coal is the most obvious and tragic example.

“Today, I would like to highlight this Administration’s environmental agenda at perhaps its most absurd. And at the heart of our story is a two-and-a-half-inch minnow–let me repeat, a two-and-a-half-inch minnow–called the Duskytail Darter.

“Last week, the Obama Administration sided with this minnow over the economic well-being of the thousands of people in southeastern Kentucky who live near and depend on Lake Cumberland as a major driver of commerce, tourism, and recreation.

“The Obama Administration did this by determining that the presence of the darter in the lake’s tributaries meant that the raising of the lake’s water level must be further delayed.

“Lake Cumberland is a signature tourist destination in my state, and one of the economic pillars of McCreary, Clinton, Laurel, Russell, Pulaski and Wayne counties. The water level of the lake was lowered in January 2007, due to problems with the dam which feeds the lake.

“The past seven years of reduced water levels have not only hurt small businesses that rely on tourism, but have also strained local governments, as local towns have had to lower their water intake.

“Marinas have had to spend valuable dollars on boat ramp upgrades and dock relocations; dollars that could have been spent on growing businesses, hiring new workers and enhancing local commerce.

“In addition, the drawdown of water has deterred tourism, as a misperception has been created among potential visitors that the lake is no longer suitable for boating, fishing and water sports.

“Every year, Lake Cumberland brings to the local community $200 million in economic activity and employs on average 6,000 people. Understandably, those in the local community have been anxious to see the water levels returned to normal.

“2014 was supposed to be a great year for Lake Cumberland, as Kentuckians would mark the end of seven years’ worth of repairs to the dam, and therefore reduced water levels and visitors. Now, suddenly the Obama Administration has announced the water level cannot be raised because it could, potentially, have a harmful effect on this minnow, the Duskytail Darter, which is on the endangered species list.

“The absurdity of the Obama Administration’s posture on this issue is manifest. First, the Administration is protecting a fish from water. Let me repeat that: the radical environmentalists in the Obama Administration don’t want this fish to be exposed to too much water. What’s next? Protecting birds from too much sky?

McConnell concluded: “I hope the Obama Administration will take heed and concern itself more with the endangered jobs and endangered livelihoods of actual Kentuckians and Americans than with the possible endangerment of this water-averse minnow.”