The recent felony murder and child abuse convictions of Delniece Williams left me with a couple of reactions:  I'm somewhat uncomfortable that we send someone to prison without parole based on a circumstantial case. But I'm sure of one thing -- Williams was woefully unprepared to be a parent.
A jury concluded that Williams killed her 8-month-old son, George “Little Georgie” Wilbur on Oct. 11, 2010, when he was found unresponsive in the Warren home of a boyfriend.

Georgie died from severe blows to his head.

No one witnessed the beating. Her defense attorneys blamed other adults in the home during a 9-hour period that day. They also noted her other son, 2 at the time, was rough-housing with Georgie, although experts said he could not have caused the fatal blows.

Williams first lied to police and finally admitted to throwing Georgie down on a bed, not enough to kill him.

Without the “smoking gun” or direct evidence, it seems tough to send the 22-year-old Williams to prison for the rest of her life without parole.

But I understand the jury. A child died, and although maybe someone could have contributed to his death, that chance doesn't seem reasonable.

Williams was his mother. She is responsible.

It's clearer that Williams wasn’t ready for the job of parenthood. She was way too immature to be having babies. She looks like a child herself.

She had her first child at 17 or 18 and Georgie at 20. She apparently shared custody of Georgie with the father, a Dearborn man.

We learned during the trial that Georgie suffered prior abuse, evidenced by old wounds in the form of bruises and cracked ribs, presumably at Williams’ hands.

We learned that Delniece was feeding Georgie a bottle per day of liquid ibuprofren to keep him from crying, probably much of it due to the pain inflicted by child abuse.

We learned during proceedings she also abused her other son, beating him one time with a shoe and another time throwing him against a wall.

Still, it'll be hard not to harbor some pity for Williams when she is sentenced Tuesday, June 19. She never should have been in that situation, even though she did it to herself and obviously has some anger issues. Barring the unlikely reversal on appeal, she’ll never see freedom.

Little Georgie never even got a chance at freedom.

Every murder is tragic. But when it involves a young child and a young mother, it seems to be even more of a waste of potential. Two lives never lived.