A Winter Garden man who shot and killed his neighbour over ATV noise at their apartment complex will spend the rest of his life in prison. Ralph Hensel was sentenced on Tuesday, November 10, in Orange County court to life in prison without the possibility of parole — one day after he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder with a firearm in the February 20, 2025, killing of Ja'Keem Williams, 32, a father of three.

Source: FOX 35 via Vinnie Politan

The judge rejected the defence's request for a 25-year prison sentence and imposed the maximum term instead. Hensel, listed as 59 in post-sentencing reporting, had been 57 when he was arrested at the scene of the shooting nearly 21 months earlier. With the sentence imposed, the criminal case is closed, although his family says a separate civil fight over the apartment complex is still to come.

A noise complaint, then two shots — February 20, 2025

Just before 4 p.m. on Thursday, February 20, 2025, the leasing office manager at Bay Pointe Apartments in Winter Garden, Orange County, called police with a simple complaint: a man was riding an ATV back and forth near the office, according to the arrest affidavit cited by the Orange Observer. About a minute later, a second call came in reporting that someone riding an ATV on Horizon Street had been shot. When officers arrived, a resident was already on the ground performing CPR on the rider.

Witnesses told police they had watched a man walk from the leasing office area toward the rider, shouting, before two loud shots were fired. Surveillance video later reviewed by investigators filled in the sequence, according to WFTV and FOX 35: Hensel went and retrieved a gun, walked across the courtyard and waited, and when the ATV rider slowed near him, shot him twice in the back of the head, FOX 35 reported, citing prosecutors. Witnesses said the shooter then walked back toward the leasing office saying, "I killed him." He surrendered to police on the spot without a struggle, and officers recovered the gun near the leasing office. Williams did not survive.

Source: WKMG News 6 (2025 police release reporting)

Williams was a father of three children, who were 7, 6 and 2 years old at the time of Hensel's sentencing; his youngest was 11 months old on the day his father died.

From a first-degree indictment to a guilty plea

Police arrested Hensel at the scene on a first-degree homicide charge, and a grand jury later indicted him on that same charge, finding the killing had been planned rather than impulsive, according to FOX 35. On Monday, November 9, 2026, Hensel pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of second-degree homicide. The Orange Observer reported that he admitted the killing itself but did not agree the case met the bar for the first-degree charge originally brought against him. As part of the plea, his side asked the court for a 25-year sentence, according to FOX 35.

Inside Tuesday's sentencing hearing

At the hearing on Tuesday, November 10, Hensel told the judge he was not troubled by what was coming. "Being in jail, your honor, has actually been a comfort to me," he said, according to FOX 35. That remark drew an immediate response from state prosecutor Frank George, who told the court: "He likes being in prison? He likes being in jail. He's comfortable there? Send him there." Williams' parents said afterwards that Hensel's comments showed a lack of remorse. The judge allowed family members to display photographs and signs as they addressed Hensel directly, in a hearing FOX 35 described as unusually emotional.

Williams' mother, Keisha Roll-McNeal, addressed Hensel directly, describing the moments he had taken from her son's children: "Every hug, every kiss, every time he would be able to tuck his children into bed, you took that from him." Brianna Hernandez, the mother of Williams' three children, asked the court why Hensel should ever have a path to freedom: "They have been sentenced to a lifetime without him, so why should the person responsible for taking his life be given the opportunity for freedom."

State Attorney Monique Worrell issued a statement after the hearing: "No sentence can bring Ja'Keem back or take away the pain his loved ones will carry for the rest of their lives. Every homicide leaves behind a family and a neighborhood that will never be the same. My heart is with everyone who loved Ja'Keem."

Source: WFTV via Vinnie Politan

What happens next

The criminal case against Ralph Hensel is closed: he pleaded guilty and has been sentenced to life without parole, and no appeal was mentioned in the coverage. The open thread is civil, not criminal — after the hearing, Hensel's family told FOX 35 they are pursuing a separate case against the Bay Pointe apartment complex and its manager to determine whether either shares responsibility for the circumstances that led to Williams' death. No filing date or court for that civil case had been reported by Wednesday.