Emma Walker was a 16-year-old student with “a big heart” who had dreams of becoming a neonatal nurse
Credit: Tennessee Department of Correction; Courtesy Walker Family
NEED TO KNOW
- Emma Walker was a 16-year-old Knoxville high school cheerleader with dreams of becoming a neonatal nurse
- Walker was fatally shot from outside while she was in bed in 2016
- Her ex-boyfriend, William Riley Gaul, was convicted of her murder and sentenced to life in prison in 2018
Emma Walker was a 16-year-old high school student who was tragically killed.
Walker, who was born and raised in Knoxville, Tenn., developed a passion for cheerleading and hoped to be a nurse. As a freshman in high school, Walker joined the cheerleading team and met football player William Riley Gaul, who went by his middle name.
While the two initially seemed to be a happy high school couple, their relationship became tumultuous over the years. Walker’s parents started to notice Gaul’s aggressive behavior and messages to their daughter, so they prohibited him from seeing her at their house.
Although Walker and Gaul continued seeing each other off and on until Gaul was a freshman in college, Walker eventually ended their relationship for good after a series of concerning incidents. However, Gaul allegedly became upset over the breakup and refused to accept it.
On the night of Nov. 21, 2016, Gaul visited Walker’s home and fired two bullets inside her room from the outside of the house. One bullet fatally hit her behind the left ear, while another went into a pillow.
Gaul, whose crimes were recounted in the Aug. 14 episode of Dateline, was arrested and charged with her murder after several of his friends reported strange behavior and two of them helped authorities recover the murder weapon. In May 2018, Gaul was convicted of his ex-girlfriend’s murder and was later sentenced to life in prison.
“We are living day by day. We are trying to find a new normal for ourselves and stay positive,” her mother, Jill Walker, told PEOPLE in 2017, while adding that they created a scholarship in her honor. “We are trying to keep Emma’s little spirit alive.”
Here’s everything to know about Emma Walker’s murder.
Who was Emma Walker?
Credit: Courtesy Walker Family
Emma Walker was born and raised by her parents, Jill and Mark Walker, in Knoxville, Tenn. While she became known for her passion for cheerleading, Walker was also a beloved daughter and sister who had dreams of becoming a neonatal nurse.
“I want people to know my daughter isn’t just a murdered cheerleader,” Jill told PEOPLE in 2017. “She was so much more than that.”
Jill pointed out that her daughter was “a sister, a friend” to many who “would act silly and didn’t care what other people thought.”
“She didn’t care about being in a certain group. She was friends with everybody,” Jill continued. “She was involved in her community, had a job and was an honors student. She was an independent little thing and could be stubborn — and sassy. She marched to her own drum.”
More than anything, Jill said, “Emma had a big heart.”
“She loved babies, animals and old people,” her mom shared. “If she saw an elderly couple together, she would always say to me, ‘Oh, there is the cutest little couple.’ ”
Walker attended Central High School in Knoxville and joined the cheerleading team as a freshman in the fall of 2014.
“Emma really took cheerleading seriously,” her friend and cheer teammate Lauren Hutton told 20/20 in 2021. “She really loved doing it. It was one of her passions. She loved leading and she loved football games. She loved just being part of crowd appeal.”
What was her relationship with William Riley Gaul?
Credit: Twitter
It didn’t take long for Walker’s being on the cheer team to catch the attention of Gaul, who was a junior wide receiver on the football team at the time.
Gaul, who was raised by his mother and grandparents, was “a little nerdy on the side” and not the “classic jock” type, his friend Zach Greene recalled to 20/20.
Jill initially thought of Gaul as the “boy next door” who was “very likable” and “very nice in the beginning.” However, their relationship began to take a turn when some of her friends noticed he allegedly became more controlling and didn’t want her hanging out with her friends.
“[Gaul] he didn’t really talk to us, her friends, a lot,” Walker’s close friend Keegan Lyle said. “But I was just like, ‘Oh he’s shy’ … it just seemed normal. But then after a while was when we got kind of concerned. He became kind of controlling over her, what she did, her activities.”
Walker and Gaul continued to date, but their relationship was riddled with “intense” arguments over social media and text messages, per Hutton. Jill claimed that Gaul often commented on her daughter’s clothing and alleged that he was sending threatening messages.
“We, on one occasion, saw one [that said] ‘I’ll see your name in the obituary,’ ” Jill recalled on 20/20. “He wrote that to her, and we questioned him about it … and he said, ‘I was just angry.’ … and that’s when [I] started to get many more red flags.”
After his behavior continued to worsen, he was banned from Walker’s home and her parents encouraged her to break up with him. However, she continued to date him into the fall of 2016 when he was a freshman at a nearby college. Walker’s parents took the situation into their own hands and monitored her activity and made her stay home.
“She did become like her old self again,” Mark noted. “She would come out of her room, eat dinner with us, and socialize with us.”
By November 2016, Walker broke up with Gaul for good. Gaul refused to accept the breakup and even faked being kidnapped to try and get her attention. He continued messaging her anonymously and sending threatening messages.
One morning after he lied about being kidnapped, Walker was home alone when she thought she saw a stranger in all black outside her house. She panicked and texted Gaul, who said that he was on his way to check things out. When Walker’s parents arrived home, they asked him to leave and told their daughter that the mysterious person was likely Gaul.
“I said to Emma, don’t you find it odd that Riley was involved, or appeared at both events. She said, no it wasn’t him Mom, it wasn’t him,” Jill remembered. “He’s trying to get her attention to talk to him. And going way overboard to do that. I was worried and we were watching her.”
What happened to Walker?
On the morning of Nov. 21, 2016, Jill went to wake up her daughter for school, but she instead found that Walker was tragically dead. She was 16 years old.
Investigators later determined that Walker was fatally shot behind the left ear with one bullet in the early hours of the morning. They found another bullet shot in her pillow.
Jill called 911, and investigators found two bullet holes in the wall that seemed to point to a person shooting the gun from outside the home and into her bedroom.
How was Gaul caught?
Credit: Facebook
Shortly after investigators found the bullet holes and determined that Walker had been killed, they interviewed several of her friends and family members. It didn’t take long for authorities to learn about her breakup with Gaul and his threatening behavior.
“Everybody kept giving us the name Riley Gaul because of their relationship, because they had seen the way that Riley had treated her, the way he’d talk to her,” Knox County Sheriff’s Lt. Allen Merritt told 20/20.
Several of Gaul’s friends also came forward with suspicious behavior. One of his friends, Alex McCarty, told detectives that Gaul had stolen his grandfather’s gun, while another alleged that Gaul had asked him how to remove fingerprints from a gun and ditch a gun.
Detectives brought in Gaul for questioning, where he told them, per the Knoxville News Sentinel, “I would hurt myself before I’d hurt her, and that’s what I’ve done. … I don’t know anyone who would want to hurt that girl.”
Gaul, who denied any involvement in Walker’s murder, claimed that he was in his dorm at the time of the murder, but investigators pinned his phone to Walker’s home around 3:45 a.m. Two of Gaul’s friends also worked with police to catch Gaul and recover the murder weapon. He was arrested for Walker’s murder on Nov. 22.
Where is Gaul now?
Credit: Knox County Sheriff’s Office
Gaul was indicted in January 2017 on seven criminal counts, including first-degree murder, especially aggravated stalking, tampering with evidence and employing a firearm during a dangerous felony.
During his May 2018 trial, his attorneys argued that while Gaul may have shot Walker, he was not trying to kill her and had just wanted to get her attention. Meanwhile, prosecutors accused Gaul of premeditating the murder by knowing where to shoot the gun.
Gaul was found guilty of all charges on May 8, 2018, and was later sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 51 years.
He is currently serving his sentence at Northwest Correctional Complex in Tiptonville, Tenn. He has an estimated release date of Jan. 27, 2075.
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