Victims Laid Out Like Egyptian Book of Dead

ATLANTA (UPI) — Convicted killer Wayne Williams did not allow a defense psychologist to testify at his trial because he would have labelled Williams as an "asexual," the psychologist says.

Dr. Brad Bayless, a Phoenix, Ariz., psychologist who examined Williams on three separate occasions also said he believed Williams — "just like everyone else" — was capable of murder, but does not think he could have acted alone in Atlanta's child killings.

"I strongly believe — it's my opinion — that Wayne is not capable of doing this all by himself," Bayless said in a telephone interview from his office Thursday. "There will be others implicated in this down the road."

Williams, a black 23-year-old freelance photographer and would-be talent scout, was sentence to two consecutive life terms after being convicted in the slaying of Jimmy Ray Payne, 21, and 27-year-old Nathaniel Cater — two of the 29 young blacks killed during a 22-month-long reign of terror. He has been linked by police to 21 other slayings.

In another development Thursday, prosecutors disclosed that the bodies of at least seven of the 29 victims were found laid out in a way strikingly similar to the layout of bodies pictured in a book on Egyptian burial rites found in Williams' home.

Prosecutors asked Williams and his father about the book during the trial but were not able to link the book directly to the defendant.

Assistant District Attorney Joe Drolet said the manner in which the victims were laid out "looked very much like some of the pictures in the Egyptian Book of the Dead." Investigators obtained a copy of the book from a local library.

Bayless, the psychologist, said he was in Atlanta ready to testify for the defense until Williams put a stop to it.

"He got very upset with me about the whole sexual arena," Bayless said.

"I was going to testify that Wayne was primarily asexual, had not had any success in either heterosexual or homosexual activity.

"He said then I don't want you to testify at all … and his attorneys couldn't convince him otherwise."

Bayless said he believed that was a serious mistake because the prosecution portrayed Williams as a closet homosexual.

Prosecution witnesses during Williams' nine-week-long trial said he had made homosexual advances to teenage boys, but Bayless said, "he didn't have the moxie to seduce a male or female."

An Atlanta television station reported Thursday that Williams' attorneys were ready to begin their appeals by filing a motion sometime today or Monday asking that Williams be declared an indigent.

Attorney Lynn Whatley told WXIA-TV the motion was necessary because the convicted killer had no money to meet his legal expenses. A similar motion filed before the trial was unsuccessful.