Edward Bennett Williams

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Edward Bennett Williams (May 31, 1920 – August 13, 1988) was a Washington, D.C. trial attorney who owned several professional sports teams.

He represented many high profile clients including Frank Sinatra, financier Robert Vesco, Playboy publisher Hugh Hefner, spy Igor Melekh, Jimmy Hoffa, organized crime figure Frank Costello, U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, Michael Milken, the Washington Post newspaper and the Reverend Sun Myung Moon.

Williams, who was a graduate of the College of the Holy Cross and Georgetown University Law Center, successfully defended – among others – Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., Jimmy Hoffa, and John Connally.

Two of Williams' closest friends were the Washington Post's Art Buchwald and Ben Bradlee. His debating team partner at Holy Cross was Robert Maheu, Howard Hughes's right hand man for many years.

In 1983 his two professional teams, the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Redskins, both won their respective championships. He owned the Orioles from 1980 to 1988. When he had bought the Orioles many feared he would move the team to Washington D.C., and these fears increased with the departure of the Colts. However, Williams never moved the team, and under his ownership, the team signed a new long term lease with Baltimore that would pay for a new stadium, which would become Oriole Park at Camden Yards. He would not live to see the new ball park.

After a long battle, Williams succumbed to cancer at age 68. His funeral was attended by most of Washington's power elite including then-Vice President George H. W. Bush.

The law library at Georgetown University Law Center was named in his honor.

[edit] References

• Krebs, Albin (August 14, 1988). Edward Bennett Williams, 68, Influential Trial Lawyer, Dies; A Brilliant 'Superlawyer.' New York Times
• The Man to See by Evan Thomas, 1991.
• "One Man's Freedom" by Edward Bennett Williams