Kawhi Leonard’s Sister Sentenced to Life in Prison for 2019 Killing of Elderly Woman

Kawhi Leonard’s sister is facing life behind bars for murdering an elderly woman in 2019.

ESPN reports Kimesha Williams, the sister of the Los Angeles Clippers star forward, has been sentenced to life without parole in connection with the murder of Afaf Assad, an 84-year-old Long Beach, California woman who Williams killed in a casino bathroom in 2019. 

Williams, along with another woman Candace Townsell, is accused of following Assad into a bathroom at Pechanga Resort Casino on Aug. 31, 2019, where they broke her skull in a robbery attempt. Assad died a few dies after the attack, and the two women were ultimately found guilty of first-degree murder, robbery and elder abuse.

The news arrives as Kawhi has missed the past two games of the Clippers’ first-round playoff series against the Phoenix Suns due to a knee injury. After dominating Games 1 and 2 with 38 and 31 points, Leonard was ruled out of Games 3 and 4 with a sprained right knee. Leonard’s current ailment is unrelated to the torn right ACL injury that kept him out all last season. 

“Symptoms got worse after Game 2,” Lawrence Frank, the Clippers’ president of basketball operations told reporters before Game 3. “Obviously, if we weren’t comfortable with [Leonard] playing [in Game 2], we wouldn’t have. But after the game, things didn’t get better. They got worse. So we will rule him out and kind of take it day by day.”