Ashley Nicole Williams

Ashley Nicole Williams was a 34-year-old White woman and a mother of five children. Friends remembered her as a caring person who, despite personal struggles, maintained a loving and open relationship with the close friend who had adopted two of her kids. In the fall of 2023, Ashley was living in Maple Valley, Washington, and had recently befriended 57-year-old Robert Leroy Frederick Riley. She told a friend she had been hanging out with him, describing him as a "cool" guy who was "into crystals," and said they were going to the gym together. According to her friend, Ashley sounded happy.

On the night of November 15, 2023, Ashley and Riley were on a wooded commercial property in Maple Valley when they were confronted by three men: Brandon Gerner, Kody Olsen, and Joshua Jones. An altercation broke out, and Riley was shot in the chest and killed. Prosecutors later said that Ashley, having witnessed the murder, was then targeted to silence her. She reportedly begged for her life as Gerner stabbed her more than 20 times. When the knife broke, Olsen shot her. During the attack, the men also shot Riley’s old, blind dog.

The next morning, November 16, a man walking his dog discovered the bodies of Ashley and Riley. They had been moved from the murder scene and dumped in bushes near Southeast 252nd Street and 238th Avenue Southeast, where they were covered with trash and debris. The King County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled both deaths homicides, confirming that each victim had died from a gunshot wound to the chest.

The investigation quickly led to the three men. One of the suspects, Kody Olsen, was never charged in the case. On December 12, 2023, he was killed in a shootout with Pierce County deputies following a DUI traffic stop and pursuit. Olsen wounded two deputies before he was fatally shot. Authorities arrested Brandon Gerner, the founder of a white supremacist prison gang, and charged him with two counts of murder in February 2024.

Brandon Gerner was tried for the killings of Ashley Williams and Robert Riley. A jury found him guilty, and on April 30, 2026, a judge sentenced him to 84 years in prison.