{"id":319739,"date":"2026-08-12T19:44:57","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T19:44:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/319739\/"},"modified":"2026-08-12T19:44:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T19:44:57","slug":"brooklyn-man-gets-26-years-to-life-for-killing-and-dismembering-girlfriend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/319739\/","title":{"rendered":"Brooklyn man gets 26 years to life for killing and dismembering girlfriend"},"content":{"rendered":"

A monstrous domestic abuser who hacked up his girlfriend,<\/a> then slept with prostitutes in her Brooklyn apartment while her dismembered remains rotted for a month in her bathroom, got 26 years to life for the horrific crime.<\/p>\n

Justin Williams, 27, of Manhattan, stashed 22-year-old D\u2019Asia Johnson\u2019s body parts in garbage bags stuffed in two suitcases<\/a> that he hid in the bathroom of her Cypress Hills apartment after killing her on Aug. 21, 2022.<\/p>\n

He used her money to pay for prostitutes, having sex with them just feet away from her chopped-up corpse, used her benefits card<\/a> to stock his cabinets with food, and even pretended to be her in an attempt to trick her frantic family members into thinking she was still alive.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just doesn\u2019t seem fair. It\u2019s not fair,\u201d the victim\u2019s uncle, Michael Bell, said at Williams\u2019 sentencing in Brooklyn Supreme Court Wednesday. \u201cI can\u2019t say other things \u2019cause it\u2019s not nice. I just want justice to be served. Please give this man what he deserves as far as his sentencing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MurderMurder victim D\u2019Asia Johnson.<\/p>\n

Williams, who admitted to the killing in a two-hour interview with police, still took the case to trail, and a Brooklyn Supreme Court jury found him guilty of murder and other offenses on June 16. His defense lawyer, Erin Darcy of the Legal Aid Society, argued at trial that Williams never intended to kill the victim.<\/p>\n

Jurors heard a harrowing voicemail left by Johnson begging one of her friends for help as Williams butchered her, stabbing her five times in the chest and four times in her back.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a case of one quick chop or one quick stab that takes a second to occur,\u201d Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Danny Chun said before handing down the sentence. \u201cThe defendant did what he did over a lengthy period of time\u2026 . He chopped her up, thinking of how to dispose of the body, used her benefit cards, stole her money, he did all kind of things in her apartment. And then when he was discovered, the first thing he tried to do was he ran. That\u2019s not the behavior of someone who is remorseful or sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chun sentenced Williams to the maximum 25 years to life for second-degree murder, plus a consecutive one-to-three year sentence for concealment of a corpse.<\/p>\n

\u201cD\u2019Asia Johnson suffered horrific violence at the hands of this defendant, who then compounded that cruelty with conduct that showed a staggering disregard for her life, her dignity and the loved ones desperately searching for her,\u201d Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\"JustinJustin Williams is sentenced at Brooklyn Supreme Court on Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2026, for the 2022 murder of his girlfriend D\u2019Asia Johnson. (Gardiner Anderson \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Williams and Johnson were romantically involved for years, and he beat and abused her,<\/a> leading her to get an order of protection.<\/p>\n

He stabbed her repeatedly on the night of the killing, and \u201chad the defendant stopped there, this would already be an egregious crime warranting a maximum sentence,\u201d assistant D.A. Matthew Perry wrote in a sentencing letter to the judge.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe defendant chopped up D\u2019Asia\u2019s body into pieces and hid her body parts in a bathroom tied up in garbage bags for almost thirty days to decompose and rot all while D\u2019asia\u2019s family and friends frantically looked for her,\u201d Perry wrote.<\/p>\n

Dismembered<\/p>\n

\"Medical<\/p>\n

Jeff Bachner\/for New York Daily News<\/p>\n

Medical Examiner’s Office personnel and NYPD officers and detectives investigate a dismembered body found in an apartment building on Linwood St. in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn on Sep. 21, 2022. (Jeff Bachner for New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Williams used towels and cleaning products to mask the smell while he lived in his dead girlfriend\u2019s apartment for a month, in a supportive housing unit for women in crisis on Linwood St. near Atlantic Ave. \u2014 until building security knocked on her door because they hadn\u2019t seen her in a while, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n

When friends came over to visit, Williams kept the windows open, and had his guests use a different bathroom.<\/p>\n

Investigators also learned he had another girlfriend, Tatiana Hacket, who was using Johnson\u2019s benefits card after her death, mostly at supermarkets in Brooklyn, according to a court filings. Hacket was sentenced to five years of probation last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know what to say,\u201d Johnson\u2019s father, Raheem Barber, told the judge Wednesday. \u201cCut to the chase \u2014 just give that man what he deserves. That\u2019s it. I don\u2019t really got nothing else nice to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JustinJustin Williams is sentenced at Brooklyn Supreme Court on Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2026 for the 2022 murder of his girlfriend, D\u2019Asia Johnson. (Gardiner Anderson \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Darcy, Williams\u2019 lawyer, pleaded for a lighter, 15-to-life sentence.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is very religious,\u201d she said. \u201cHe is a man of faith, and he is someone who is full of remorse and full of contrition, and he\u2019s repentant\u2026. We didn\u2019t go to trial lightly\u2026 No pretrial offer was extended to Justin, and it\u2019s not reasonable to have expected him to accept a life sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added, \u201cJustin\u2019s always maintained that he did not intend this tragic result, despite the fact that he\u2019s acknowledged what he did throughout the case.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if he wanted to make a statement, Williams took a long look back at the courtroom audience, which included both his family and relatives of his victim, and said, \u201cI love you all.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A monstrous domestic abuser who hacked up his girlfriend, then slept with prostitutes in her Brooklyn apartment while…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":319740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,8883,100,99,120541,16977,120540,89213,3290,1027,120542,120539,259,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-319739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-criminal-court","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-criminal-sentence","tag-cypress-hills","tag-dasia-johnson","tag-dismemberment","tag-domestic-violence","tag-homicide","tag-judge-danny-chun","tag-justin-williams","tag-murder","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/319740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}