After Holly Williams and her lover William Lanway tried to blackmail Erik Charles Maund, the heir of a car company in Texas, he was found guilty of a murder-for-hire scheme to kill them.
The blackmailers were killed by two ex-Marines and an ex-Israel Defense Forces veteran for whom Maund paid $750,000. The bodies were discovered in an Acura that had lost control, crashed into a tree, and then careened down a steep slope near Nashville, Tennessee. Head wounds were sustained by both victims from gunshots.
According to the allegations, Maund had an affair with Williams, a sex worker. He was threatened with the exposure of his romance with Williams unless he paid $25,000.
To get to the bottom of who was blackmailing him, Maund paid $60,000 to former Israeli Defense Forces member Gilad Peled. While visiting his son in Nashville, Tennessee, Peled testified that Maund used escort services. A text message requesting payment in return for silence on Maund’s escort services was sent to him.
Despite Peled’s urgings, Maund hesitated to report the blackmail plot to authorities. He enlisted the help of two ex-Marines, Bryon Brockway and Adam Carey, to spy on Williams and Lanway in Nashville.
The heir to the auto business was allegedly “freaked out” when Lanway contacted Maund’s house. On March 11, 2020, around 8 p.m., Lanway asked that Maund pay him $25,000. Maund allegedly accepted Brockway’s offer to “take Mr. Lanway out” after he made the suggestion. Evidence suggests that Maund did pay Peled $550,000 in addition to $100,000 to Brockway and Carey.
After Brockway shot and killed Lanway in Williams’ apartment complex’s parking lot, Carey went to the construction site and killed Williams.
Carey and Brockway were found guilty of conspiracy to conduct abduction, kidnapping resulting in death, and conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire on November 17.
Upon sentencing in 2024, they will both be faced with the prospect of a mandatory life term or the death penalty.
It was more than a year after the killings, Maund, together with Gilad Peled Byron Brockway of Austin and Adam Carey of North Carolina, were apprehended.
