State prisoner found guilty in 2021 murder; victim’s body still not found

LANSING — An Ingham County jury found a 57-year-old Lansing man guilty of second-degree murder in the 2021 death of Andrew Watson, a case local prosecutors won despite the fact that Watson’s body has never been recovered.

The verdict against Willie James Jr. was delivered in the courtroom of Ingham County Circuit Judge Rosemarie Aquilina, marking the conclusion of a trial that hinged on circumstantial evidence.

James, already a state prisoner, faces a mandatory consecutive sentence because he was on parole at the time of the killing.

The conviction stems from the January 2021 disappearance of Watson.

During the trial, Ingham County prosecutors argued that James shot and killed Watson inside his vehicle before disposing of the evidence.

According to previous media reports, the proceedings took an unusual turn when James testified in his own defense, attempting to distance himself from a trail of forensic inconsistencies.

Under cross-examination by Ingham County Prosecutor Bill Crino, James admitted to lying to investigators and scrubbing his vehicle in the hours following Watson’s disappearance.

While James admitted to the cleanup, he maintained his innocence regarding the homicide itself. He testified that his son, Willie James III, and another associate had borrowed his car on the night of Jan. 12, 2021. He claimed Watson was killed during that window of time without his involvement.

James claimed that he was covering up for his son.

The younger James, Willie James III, is currently serving a minimum 70-year sentence for an unrelated homicide committed in Eaton County in late 2020.

The elder James has a significant criminal history. At the time of the 2021 murder, he was on parole for a 2014 conviction of assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder and a felony firearm charge. Following the allegations in the Watson case, he was returned to the custody of the Michigan Department of Corrections to continue serving that earlier sentence.

Records show James was previously eligible for parole on the 2014 charges and would have reached his maximum discharge date in November 2030. Under Michigan law, because the murder was committed while James was a parolee, the sentence for the new conviction must be served only after the completion of his prior term.