The plea deal reduced a homicide charge after a July 2025 family confrontation at a North Side apartment.
MILWAUKEE, Wis. — A Milwaukee County judge has placed an 18-year-old man on probation after he admitted fatally shooting his father during a family fight last summer at an apartment near North 11th Street and West Atkinson Avenue.
Corey D. Williams pleaded guilty on Feb. 12 to a reduced charge of homicide by negligent handling of a dangerous weapon in the July 2, 2025, death of 47-year-old Corey Williams Sr. Judge David Swanson imposed a prison sentence, then stayed it and ordered five years of probation instead. The outcome closed one phase of a case that began with a 911 call from a grandmother and raised unanswered questions about whether the older Williams had a gun during the confrontation that ended his life.
Police were sent to the 1100 block of W. Atkinson Ave. at about 2:40 p.m. on July 2 after a caller told a dispatcher, “My grandson shot his daddy up there.” When officers entered the apartment, they found Corey Williams Sr. in the living room with gunshot wounds to his left arm, shoulder, chest, abdomen and groin. He was pronounced dead at the scene. A 9 mm handgun was recovered from the floor near the body. Investigators later said the shooting happened in front of relatives who had gathered at the apartment while younger children were being picked up. The younger Williams, then 18, was arrested and later told police he had fired the shots. His grandfather told officers the teen came downstairs after the gunfire and said, “I shot him,” according to the criminal complaint.
In interviews described in court records, Williams said he had been living with his father but was kicked out about two weeks before the shooting and moved in with his sister. He told detectives he returned to the apartment with his mother and brother to pick up siblings who were already there. Williams said his parents began arguing and he stepped in to help the family leave. According to his account, his father grabbed him by the collar, pushed him around the apartment and was holding a pistol while telling him to show respect and be quiet. Williams said he was forced over a table, saw another gun there, grabbed it and fired more than five times. Prosecutors later said it was not clear whether the father ever had a gun. Other relatives told investigators they did not see either man with a firearm during the struggle, leaving a central part of the self-defense claim unresolved in public reporting.
The case moved quickly after the killing. Prosecutors first charged Williams with second-degree reckless homicide while armed, a more serious felony than the count that ended the case. At an early court appearance on July 7, both prosecutors and the defense said Williams had no prior criminal record. His cash bond was set at $10,000, and he was barred from having weapons while the case was pending. Defense attorney Jade Hall said in court that the shooting was “an extremely sad case for a variety of reasons” and said Williams told her the fatal encounter was not the first time his father had abused him. That claim did not receive a public finding in court records available through news reports, but it became part of the defense narrative as the case moved toward a plea agreement. The family setting also shaped the case from the start, because the confrontation grew out of a domestic argument inside a home crowded with close relatives and children.
The plea and sentence were entered on Feb. 12 in Milwaukee County court. Williams admitted guilt to homicide by negligent handling of a dangerous weapon, replacing the original reckless homicide charge. Swanson imposed a sentence described in court reporting as five years in prison with three years of extended supervision, then stayed that term and put Williams on probation for five years. Other reports described the punishment more broadly as a five- to eight-year state sentence that was stayed. Either way, the practical result was the same: Williams did not go directly to prison, but he remains under court supervision and could be ordered to serve the stayed term if he violates probation. Court-imposed conditions bar him from possessing firearms and from using alcohol or non-prescription drugs. No appeal, revocation action or new sentencing date had been reported as of mid-March 2026.
What remained most striking in the record was how many of the key details came from family members describing a fight that exploded in seconds. The grandfather told police he had gone to the store with Corey Williams Sr. earlier that day and later woke up to gunshots. Outside the apartment, he saw Williams’ mother crying as she came down the stairs with children. She told him she did not want her son to go to jail, he said, before telling him that Corey Williams Jr. had shot his father. In court, the commissioner handling the early appearance openly questioned whether the victim had a gun, saying it would make “a big difference” in understanding what happened. Prosecutor Karine O’Byrne said at that hearing that police recovered two guns but that the state did not then know whether one had been found by the body. That uncertainty never disappeared from public accounts, even as the criminal case ended with a plea.
The case now stands with Williams on probation and his father dead after a family dispute that turned fatal inside a Milwaukee apartment. The next major milestone would come only if probation is revoked or a court filing changes the sentence already entered on Feb. 12, 2026.
Author note: Last updated March 15, 2026.