SANTA CLARA, Calif. (AP) — Defensive end Mykel Williams has spent nearly a year working his way back after a torn knee ligament cut short his rookie season for the San Francisco 49ers.
The grueling rehab process is now complete and Williams is ready to make his return to the field on Sunday when the 49ers take on the defending Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks.
“I'm going crazy. I'm losing my mind," Williams said Wednesday. "I’m ready to go. I’m excited to play ball. I miss playing ball. It’s been like damn near a year since I played, so I just want to get back on the field.”
The Niners' planned move to activate Williams from the physically unable to perform list later this week couldn't come at a better time with San Francisco missing several key players on the defensive line ahead of the showdown against Seattle. Star pass rusher Nick Bosa remains sidelined by a calf injury and rookie defensive tackle James Thompson Jr. is set to miss a second straight game with an ankle injury.
San Francisco also has three other key defensive linemen on injured reserve with Alfred Collins, C.J. West and Sam Okuayinonu out for significant time. The 49ers are tied with the sixth-fewest sacks in the league with six and had none last week against Denver.
“It’s been killing me just watching it transpire how it has been,” Williams said. “I’m just ready to get back on the field.”
Williams was the 11th overall pick in 2025 and made an immediate impact on San Francisco’s run defense last season before getting hurt. The 49ers improved their yards per carry allowed by 0.28 per carry before his injury.
Williams has 20 tackles, with 19 pressures, four tackles for loss, one sack and one fumble recovery but he felt he had much more to give.
"I wasn’t happy with what I did, to be real,” he said. “I know the type of player I am, and I don’t think I represented myself well on tape last year. Whether that was for different reasons or ... I just didn't play the best to my ability.”
Williams said he worked on several areas in the offseason once he was healthy enough to practice, including his get-off speed, pad level, hand usage and his pass rush plan.
He also became leaner after improving his diet by cutting down on sweets such as ice cream and his favorite peach cobbler. The hope is that will help him get off the ball faster.
“We’re going to see Sunday," he said.
San Francisco will also be without fullback Kyle Juszczyk (knee) and S Marques Sigle (ankle) this week after they both got hurt last week.
Cornerback Upton Stout (shoulder) also missed practice Wednesday but still has a chance to play this week. Receiver Mike Evans (ribs) and running back Kaelon Black (illness) were limited.
Running back Christian McCaffrey, left tackle Trent Williams and linebacker Dre Greenlaw all got a rest day Wednesday and missed practice.
The team also placed receiver Dante Pettis on the practice squad injury list after he hurt his calf last week and signed receiver Xavier Smith to take his place.
See AP’s full NFL coverage here
FILE - San Francisco 49ers defensive end Mykel Williams walks off of the field after an NFL football game against the Los Angeles Rams, Oct. 2, 2025, in Inglewood, Calif. (AP Photo/Jessie Alcheh, File)
ITHACA, N.Y. (AP) — The woman accusing several men of raping her at a Cornell University fraternity party was “misled” about the status of the criminal investigation in the weeks after she went to police, her lawyer said Wednesday.
Even as she took her allegations about a 2024 gang rape at the Chi Phi fraternity house through Cornell's internal disciplinary process, the university's police department gave her the impression that a criminal investigation was continuing, lawyer Thomas Giuffra told The Associated Press.
In fact, the criminal inquiry ended almost as soon as it began.
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten, the local prosecutor, made the decision not to go forward with a criminal case within days of the woman giving her first substantial interviews to police.
Van Houten has said that he asked Cornell's police department to convey the decision to the woman, who is referred to in court documents as Jane Doe, but never spoke personally to her or her lawyer.
Giuffra said the woman was told that the criminal investigation was ongoing.
“I think she was misled. She was told it was still — they weren’t going to prosecute, but they were still investigating," Giuffra said. ”I was involved with this case early on. I thought they were still investigating. It was news to me that they weren’t doing anything."
Giuffra added that at the time, he assumed investigators just needed more time to speak with witnesses and build a case.
“But nothing was being done, and we didn’t know that,” Giuffra said.
A message seeking comment was left for Van Houten. Cornell’s media relations office, citing pending litigation, declined comment on behalf of the university’s police department.
The district attorney said in a statement last week that he was confident that no further investigation was necessary after prosecutors and criminal investigators from his office reviewed a six-page summary of the woman's account, written by a police officer.
Based on that summary, Van Houten said he believed no crime had been committed, and that the woman's participation in drug use and sex was “voluntary, conscious and consensual.”
That description differs sharply with what the woman told police and university investigators, and with what she alleged in a lawsuit filed against seven Chi Phi fraternity members, Cornell and others last month.
Among other things, Giuffra said, the six-page report omitted the woman telling investigators, “I can say with 100% confidence I was raped," that she was subjected to physical violence, and that a fraternity brother had sent a message to a group chat using a vulgar term to advertise that a woman’s body was freely available.
Last week, citing investigative records it obtained, The New York Times reported that a Cornell police investigator tried to get Van Houten’s office to consider additional evidence in the weeks after the alleged rape, but was rebuffed.
“At first I thought these police were incompetent," Giuffra said. "It sounds like they were doing the right thing. And they just got shut down.”
Giuffra said that while he and Jane Doe have received death threats, he has been heartened by an outpouring of support, including rallies and protests on the Cornell campus and more than 1,000 women who have emailed him to share anger, frustration, solidarity and stories of their own assaults.
Some Cornell students staged a sit-in at a dining hall and vowed not to spend money on campus Wednesday to protest sexual violence and how the university has handled complaints, in the latest expression of outrage over an alleged 2024 gang rape at a fraternity house.
A handwritten sign reading “Justice for Jane Doe ” — the name under which the accuser is suing — was propped on an empty table in the dining hall in the afternoon. Some students sat around the room without eating, while others lunched. Another small group sat outside holding signs with messages such as “we are Jane Doe.”
The demonstrations were meant to spotlight complaints that the university is slow to respond to reports of sexual assault while quick to protect its reputation. Among other demands, the groups want the university to retool disciplinary procedures for addressing complaints and expel or revoke the degrees of anyone involved in the alleged October 2024 sexual assault.
Jane Doe, who was a student then, alleges that Chi Phi members plied her with alcohol and drugs and several sexually assaulted her. One man sent others a message inviting them to participate, according to a lawsuit she filed last month.
Lawyers for two of the men have denied they participated in a sexual assault. Attempts by The Associated Press to reach the others or their representatives have been unsuccessful. Some of the men who underwent a university disciplinary hearing in 2024 told investigators that the sexual activity was consensual or said they were not involved.
The woman went to Cornell police in November 2024, though no criminal charges resulted. In the wake of her lawsuit, Van Houten said he was reopening the investigation. Days later, Gov. Kathy Hochul took the case away from him and appointed the state’s attorney general, Letitia James, as a special prosecutor.
Giuffra applauded the move, saying he was troubled by Van Houten’s plan for conducting the reopened investigation and “didn’t think he was up to the task.” Giuffra said the district attorney wanted to take the case to a grand jury and have Jane Doe testify before the panel within two weeks.
That timeline, leaving little time to review evidence or interview witnesses, suggested that Van Houten may have been trying “to go take a dive and not really give it his best effort and not do any investigation,” Giuffra said.
James hasn't said how long her investigation might take, but she suggested it would take months.
On Wednesday, one of the men named in Jane Doe’s lawsuit filed a court petition seeking James' removal from the case, arguing she showed bias by posting on social media a few days before her appointment: “What this young woman has been forced to endure is horrific and unacceptable.”
A message seeking comment was left for James' office.
Cornell closed down the Chi Phi campus chapter in 2024 and says it expelled some students and suspended others after an investigation under the federal Title IX law.
This week Cornell trustees brought in former U.S. Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to review how the school investigates sexual assault and sexual harassment, how the disciplinary process works, the campus police response and more.
A sign is displayed in support of Jane Doe during a sit-in protest at Cornell University, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026, in Ithaca, N.Y. (AP Photo/Matt Burkhartt)
Students and attendees sit during a sit-in protest at Cornell University, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026, in Ithaca, N.Y. (AP Photo/Matt Burkhartt)
Students and attendees sit during a sit-in protest at Cornell University, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026, in Ithaca, N.Y. (AP Photo/Matt Burkhartt)
Student Isabel Breslin works on her laptop during a sit-in protest at Cornell University, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026, in Ithaca, N.Y. (AP Photo/Matt Burkhartt)
