To Kill A Cheerleader | God, Glory, and Glamor | 1

It's January 28th, 1991 in Channel View, Texas, a Monday night in the Holloway household.

36-year-old Wanda Holloway moves from room to room in the quaint bungalow.

She checks that her two teenage kids have finished their homework, picks laundry up off their bedroom floors, and reminds them that they have to leave by six.

She wants to get them to the church on time for the weekly youth meeting, and they've promised to collect her son's girlfriend on the way.

Wanda's just grabbing her purse from the kitchen counter when the phone rings.

With a sigh, she checks her watch and picks up the receiver.

She tenses up when she hears the voice of her ex-husband's brother Terry Harper.

She tells him to hold on a sec, then checks over her shoulder to make sure no one's nearby.

Her family can't overhear this conversation.

When she's sure the coast is clear, Wanda asks Terry what he wants.

He tells her that he's all set for their meeting later.

Wanda's heart starts beating faster as she tells Terry they'll have to postpone.

She hasn't been able to get the money just yet.

Terry doesn't let her finish.

He tells her that the guy will take a pair of her diamond earrings instead of the cash if Wanda's still interested, that is.

Wanda looks around the room again.

Her dark brown curls bouncing as she turns.

Swallowing, she says, that'll work for her.

She's got a pair of diamonds she won't miss.

Terry's pleased.

Now there's just one thing they have to settle.

Does Wanda want to take out the mother, the daughter, or both?

Wanda draws breath to answer, then freezes when she sees her own daughter, 13-year-old Shanna, wander into the kitchen.

Eventually, Wanda stammers out that she's happy with the first one.

That's the mother.

Terry says he understands and tells Wanda that he'll meet her in the parking lot of a restaurant a few miles west of town.

Wanda says she'll be there by seven, then hangs up.

Flustered after her conversation, Wanda can feel a hot, nervous prickling in her stomach.

But she can't stop and second guess her decision now.

Apart from anything else, she has to get her kids out the door.

She tells Shannon to fetch her brother and get in the car.

Then, grabbing her purse, Wanda dashes into her bedroom and opens up her jewelry box.

There are plenty of glittering baubles inside, but she just needs a small pair of diamond studs.

They're worth a couple grand easy.

She drops them into a small plastic bag and tucks them into her purse.

After that, all Wanda has to do is drop her kids off at church and go meet Terry.

It's time to hire a hitman.

From Airship, I'm Jeremy Schwartz, and this is American Criminal.

Ask any parent, and they'll probably tell you that they do anything for their children, anything.

But anything can mean very different things to different people.

For some, it's working two jobs to send their kid to college.

For others, it's finally finding the strength to leave an abusive relationship.

And then, there are the parents who, for better or worse, believe that doing right by their kids involves pushing them to excel, to be the best, to achieve dreams that they themselves never saw through.

Sometimes, that kind of pressure can border on the abusive.

And in extreme cases, it can turn deadly.

In 1991, the small town of Channel View, Texas, was shocked to discover just how far one mother was determined to go to ensure her daughter's success.

But in a place where high school football was everything and glory was fleeting, there were only so many chances a kid could get.

So when Wanda Holloway's teenage daughter failed to make the cheerleading team, she became obsessed with the girl she felt stood in the way.

In her mind, that girl and her mother were cheats.

They were stuck ups.

They were the bane of Wanda's existence.

And that meant they had to go.

This is episode one in our three-part series on Wanda Holloway.

God, Glory, and Glamour.

It's a Wednesday night in the fall of 1968 in Channel View, Texas.

Fourteen-year-old Wanda Webb is arriving home from church with her parents, Clyde and Verna.

Wanda's older brother heads into his bedroom, and Verna goes to the kitchen to make some tea.

But Wanda has something she wants to talk to her father about, and it can't wait.

So she follows Clyde to his workshop at the back of their home.

The Webs live in a modest house, a simple wood-framed cottage on the south side of Channel View.

Wanda's father is proud of the home he's provided for his family through his job at a cement testing plant, but he's never content to rest on his laurels.

So for years, he spent his downtime in his workshop, where he does odd jobs for anyone willing to pay him.

He'll fix people's cars, repair lawn mowers, and square up a rickety chair.

Tonight, with Wanda hot on his heels, Clyde heads to his workbench where a half-disassembled vacuum cleaner lies waiting.

Wanda stands in the doorway for a moment, watching her father in the light cast by a swinging bulb just above his head.

When he doesn't acknowledge her presence after a few seconds, she screws up her courage, clears her throat, and speaks up.

She wants to try out for the school's drill team, she tells him, and she knows she'll need his permission to do that.

Wanda's a freshman at Channelview High.

The semester is only a couple of weeks old, but she's already eager to join the squad of girls who perform during halftime at the school's football games.

With a focus on precision choreography, drill teams have been a Texas staple since they were first created in the 1930s.

Wanda loves the glamour of the girls on the squad, the attention they get from the rest of the students.

They're the celebrities of the campus.

To her, being on drill team is a surefire path to popularity.

But Clyde Webb isn't swayed by such petty notions.

His only concern is with the squad's uniforms.

He's been to the high school's football games.

He's seen what those girls wear, pleated skirts that finish above the knee, tall boots and blouses that are far too snug to be considered modest.

It's not right.

So, no, Clyde tells his teenage daughter, she can't try out for the drill team.

What they wear is whorish, and his daughter ain't no whore.

Being forbidden to join the drill team denies Wanda Webb one of the few chances she has to stand out in high school.

And in a place like Channelview, high school might just be the only time someone ever stands out.

Although it's located near enough to Houston to be considered an outer suburb of the city, Channelview feels like a small rural town.

By the time Wanda's in high school, Channelview's population is still less than 10,000.

So it's the kind of place where everyone knows everyone.

Monday to Friday, most of the men work in the area's petrochemical facilities and manufacturing plants, earning similar wages and similar positions.

Their wives take care of the kids and keep house.

Then on Sunday, they praise God and get ready to do it all again.

Other than going to work and raising a family, there's not a lot to do in Channelview.

The interstate cuts the town in half.

On the south side, where the webs live, there are a few dive bars and chain restaurants.

And there's the shipping channel, gray smokestacks and endless walls of shipping containers sliding by on their way to the port of Houston.

The north side of Channelview, though, is the nicer part of town.

It's where the area's hospitals are and the schools, where local kids can shine on the sports field and their community can bask in reflected glory.

Young Wanda won't get to hear the crowd cheering for her, though.

When her father forbids her from joining the school drill squad, she knows there's no use arguing.

Wanda's seen firsthand how her father can get when he's made up his mind about something.

When she was younger, Clyde clashed with the elders at their missionary Baptist church over an outing where men and women were allowed to swim in the same pool.

He didn't think it was proper and insisted that the problem be addressed.

When he didn't get his way, Clyde gathered together a splinter group that broke away and started a new church.

That's not the kind of man who'd appreciate his daughter defying him.

So Wanda's resigned to her fate as an obscure face in the high school crowd, watching the drill team girls in the uniform she thinks are glamorous.

Wistfully, she dreams about how if she was given a chance, she could be a star like them too.

But she doesn't do anything about it.

She's a good daughter.

She's a good student too.

Excelling in class is run by the Vocational Office Education Department.

Typing, secretarial skills, that sort of thing.

But with sport and performance seemingly off the table, Wanda's extracurriculars are kind of limited.

She takes piano lessons, then sings and plays at church, which she attends three times a week with her family.

And she joins the Future Homemakers of America, a club that helps students prepare for a career looking after a family.

It's not as glamorous as being on the drill team, but that's okay.

Wanda finds room for style wherever she can, like how she backcombs her hair into a helmet-like bouffant.

It's hardly the newest trend by the time Wanda adopts the look, but it feels elegant to her.

And looking good is something she'll be fastidious about far beyond her high school years.

For now, though, Wanda knows that one day she'll have a house, a husband and a family, and her life will feel complete.

When she's 15, Wanda meets the boy who'll help fulfill three of the dreams she has for her life.

Tony Harper is a senior when Wanda first notices him.

Bespeckled and kind of short, Tony's not a star athlete or a class clown or a stoner.

In fact, he's kind of like Wanda, an average guy who just blends into the crowd.

Despite that, or maybe because of it, Wanda's smitten.

Tony's family lives just a couple streets away from Wanda's in a similar kind of home to the Webb's.

But the Harpers aren't quite the typical Channel View residents because they've got a bit of money.

Tony's dad, RE., owns a gas station and convenience store, and his mom, Peggy, owns a lingerie boutique.

They're not rich, rich, but they do all right for themselves.

In Channel View, where just about everyone's on a level playing field, people who have money don't tend to get splashy with it.

Anyone with the instinct to show off has probably already moved down the road to Houston.

And while the Harpers mostly follow this unspoken rule, they aren't stingy.

So when Tony invites her over for dinner with his family one night, Wanda can't help but notice their relative wealth.

The first thing she sees is a shiny Cadillac in the driveway.

Tony explains that it's his mother's.

Once they get inside to the kitchen, Peggy's all smiles and kindness.

It's clear she's excited to meet her son's girlfriend, asking plenty of questions as she prepares the meal.

But while Peggy's focusing on everything Wanda says, Wanda has a hard time concentrating on the conversation.

Her eyes keep darting to the sparkling diamond rings on Peggy's fingers.

All through dinner, Wanda's imagining what her future might look like.

Driving a caddy, sporting diamonds.

People would see her then.

They'd pay attention to her.

Maybe that thought is why Wanda's only too happy to talk about marriage with Tony.

They've been dating for less than a year when the subject first comes up, and 16-year-old Wanda doesn't flinch.

But it's not all that uncommon for high school sweethearts to marry young in this part of the world.

It's like everyone's eager to get going with their adult lives as soon as possible.

Like they're imagining that that's when the real fun has to begin.

So when Tony graduates in 1970, he doesn't go off to college or explore the world to find out who he is.

Instead, he hangs out in Channelview, waiting for Wanda to finish high school too.

Then in 1972, just days after her own graduation, Wanda's walking down the aisle at Channelview Missionary Baptist Church.

Her dress covers everything below the neck, but it's still stylish.

In an early 70s kind of way.

She's let go of the bouffant by now, and her hair hangs sleek and straight around her shoulders, coming to rest just above the trailing pink and white bouquet in her hands.

Wanda's so happy that day.

She's the center of attention, and it's everything she's always imagined it would be.

If this is what being an adult means, she can't wait for the rest of her life to begin.

But Wanda's wedded bliss will be short lived.

Her dream life will be harder to get than she expected.

And when things don't go her way, well, she'll just do what she has to do.

It's Thanksgiving 1972 in Channel View, Texas.

The Webb family home feels warm and celebratory as everyone settles around the table for dinner.

It's the first holiday since 18-year-old Wanda Webb became Wanda Harper, so there's a sense of newness to the occasion.

Wanda's been helping her mother, Verna, in the kitchen all day, and their husbands are complimenting them on a job well done.

After Wanda's father carves the bird and everyone's plates are full, Wanda turns to Tony.

She can't remember if tomorrow is an official holiday or not.

Tony pats Wanda's leg and says that it is, which means he doesn't have to work.

He's a warehouse clerk from Missouri Pacific Railroad, and he's been looking forward to extra time off all month.

But Wanda barely acknowledges his answer.

As soon as Tony's done talking, she turns to Clyde with a thoughtful expression on her face.

Is that right?

She asks her father.

It's a small moment, small enough that no one else at the table thinks about it.

But Tony sure does.

It's not the first time Wanda's done this.

She's always checking with Clyde for confirmation on every little thing.

She just can't seem to break the habit of deferring to her dad.

Tony says nothing.

He just smiles and eats his meal.

He and Wanda could talk about this later.

Right from the jump, Wanda and Tony's marriage displays some pretty deep cracks.

But either their loved ones don't notice the problems, or they figure the kids will grow out of it, because no one steps in to suggest that maybe getting married was a mistake.

Before long, it's too late to speak up, because Wanda gets pregnant pretty quickly.

In July of 1973, just over a year after the wedding, she gives birth to the couple's first child, a boy she names Shane.

They bring him home to the small apartment they rent on the south side of town.

As 19-year-old Wanda settles into her new role as mother, Tony's out winning bread for his family.

In addition to his position at the warehouse, he eventually starts working as a part-time insurance salesman.

Neither of the jobs is all that lucrative though, so Tony's parents try and ease the strain by paying Wanda to help them out around the house with cleaning, cooking and grocery shopping.

On the whole, the young couple are doing okay.

Not great, but okay.

Though underneath that unremarkable exterior lies a stagnant relationship that's just getting more strained every day.

The main problem, at least as far as Tony can see, is that they don't have enough sex.

He's a young man in his twenties, so that's where his mind is more often than not.

But Wanda just doesn't like sex.

So now that they've had their first child, she's happy to abstain as much as she can.

Now, Tony doesn't think that his wife's feelings about sex are a reflection on his performance in the bedroom or his ability to help Wanda enjoy herself.

Instead, he puts it down to her stifling religious upbringing.

His family, like almost everyone else in Channel View, are regular churchgoers, but the webs are next level, and Tony's certain that's what's messed Wanda up.

Case in point, she point blank refuses to do it on Sundays.

That's the Lord's Day.

It just wouldn't be right.

Eventually, Tony convinces Wanda that they should speak to someone about their issues.

They go to a couples counselor, but even that doesn't get Tony enough play.

So he goes right to the top.

He calls his wife's gynecologist.

Exactly why the doctor offers Tony advice in this case is anyone's guess, but he suggests that they should go ahead and have another kid.

It's the doc's opinion that a woman's hormones increase after her second pregnancy, and that might help things progress in the bedroom.

So, following doctor's orders, Wanda and Tony welcome baby number two in August of 77.

23-year-old Wanda is instantly in love with the little girl, who they name Shanna.

Unfortunately for Tony, though, Wanda's libido remains much as it ever was.

It's incredibly frustrating for him.

Now, he has an extra mouth to feed, and he's barely getting any.

Of course, he dotes on his kids, but in his mind, a guy can only take so much.

That's why he starts sleeping with other women.

Later, he'll say, this was also official advice from a doctor.

According to Tony, he goes to see someone about a persistent backache, and this guy tells him that his pain is originating from his prostate gland, which is criminally underutilized.

So he has to start sleeping around.

You know, for his condition.

If Wanda knows that Tony's stepping out on her, it's something she keeps to herself.

But given the way the couple fight all the time, she probably knows something's up.

They're always sniping at each other in public, trading insults in front of their friends and families, and not really making any effort to hide their general contempt for one another.

Still, they soldier on with their marriage, and even start to build a more permanent foundation for their fractious relationship.

They buy a plot of land right next door to Tony's parents, and with the help of Wanda's dad, Tony builds his family a house.

Being in such close proximity to a sympathetic ear, both Wanda and Tony go to Peggy with all their troubles.

She tries to give them both advice, but neither of them seem all that interested in listening to her.

They just want to complain about each other.

Nevertheless, Peggy does her best to be a supportive mother-in-law.

Having heard both sides of the couple's issues, she gently suggests that Wanda speak to a therapist on her own about her aversion to sex.

Peggy shares that she had similar sexual hangups to Wanda back when she was first married, ones that came from her religious upbringing.

But then she saw a professional who helped her work through her issues.

And now look at her.

She owns a successful lingerie store.

Wanda balks at that idea.

There's nothing wrong with her.

Tony still disagrees, of course, because not only does Wanda continue to resist his advances in the bedroom, she also keeps turning down opportunities for them to spend more time together.

According to his version of things, he's always trying to get Wanda to come on his weekend fishing trips, and she's never the least bit interested.

So he takes his girlfriend instead.

And hey, he doesn't see anything wrong with that.

If his wife doesn't want to hang out with him, he's got someone who's much better company.

By 1979, this is happening all the time.

And either Wanda suspects what's going on on these weekends away or she's got proof of it, because one day she decides to pay her husband a surprise visit.

Now this next bit is all Tony's story because Wanda's never given her account of this day, and that is just something to keep in mind.

Okay, anyway, Wanda leaves her kids with her in-laws for the day and drives out to where Tony's camping.

And sure enough, there he is with some other woman that Wanda's never seen before, and that does it for her.

She'll put up with an unhappy marriage, but she won't be humiliated like this.

She pulls out a gun and starts waving it around, pointing it first to Tony, then at his girlfriend.

Suddenly Tony's little romantic getaway feels very life and death.

He doesn't know whether Wanda wants to kill him, his lady friend or herself.

But whatever the plan is, he knows he can't let it go any further.

Jumping forward, he grabs Wanda's arm, and after a quick struggle, he manages to get the gun from her hand.

As Tony pulls back, both he and Wanda are panting.

She looks from him to the other woman, then back to him.

Her gaze is steely.

Then, after a long, tense beat, she softens.

All of a sudden, she's acting all sweet.

She apologizes to Tony for turning down his invitation to come fishing, and after thinking about it, she's decided that she'd like to come along.

But Tony is not having any of that.

He doesn't need Wanda here with him, nor does he want her here.

That's what he tells her, right to her face.

With this frustrated little scream, Wanda turns around and storms back to her car.

Tony watches her drive away.

He's relieved that he can get back to his weekend.

When he gets home that Sunday night, though, Tony gets a nasty surprise.

He pulls into the driveway to find the garage door wide open.

Inside, he can see stacks of boxes and a couple of suitcases.

All of his belongings, every piece of clothing neatly folded and waiting for him to pick them up.

With that, it's the end of the marriage.

It had never been a great match.

And now, after seven years, it's finally over.

As Tony's in the garage going through all the things Wanda's packed up for him, she's inside taking care of their kids.

She doesn't have time to litigate the implosion of their union.

She's got a family to raise.

Besides, she's ready for a change, an upgrade even.

Looking back on it, she can see that marrying Tony was a mistake.

He was never gonna be enough for her.

He could never help her build the tidy, glamorous life she'd imagine she'd have as a wife and mother.

Now, she's free to go and find someone who's worthy of her.

And it won't take her long to find husband number two.

It's the summer of 1980, and 26-year-old Wanda Harper is in her kitchen, twirling the long phone cord around her finger while she waits for someone to answer her call.

Wanda's divorce has just been finalized, so she's a single mother now, with two young kids to look after.

She also has to get herself a job and start earning money.

It's a lot for any one person to handle.

But that doesn't mean Wanda hasn't got time for a little pettiness.

After a few rings, a secretary at Missouri Pacific Railroad picks up, and Wanda has to be put through to someone in Human Resources.

When she's got an HR rep on the line, she tells them that they need to know something about one of the clerks in their warehouse.

Tony Harper, he's been stealing from the company for years.

They really ought to look into that, Wanda says, before hanging up.

In the seconds after the call, Wanda feels the thrill of victory.

She's gotten one over on her cheating ex-husband.

That'll show him.

Then checking her watch, Wanda hurries off to wake her three-year-old daughter from her nap.

Then they've got to go meet Shane, her son, when he gets off the school bus in a few minutes.

The work of a mother never ends.

Whether he's really stealing from his employer or not, Tony Harper loses his job at the railroad because of Wanda's phone call.

Add to that the fact that Wanda got the house that Tony built and the kids in the divorce, and it's clear who came out on top.

But Wanda's not concerned with Tony's well-being.

She's too focused on creating the life she's always deserved.

Tony couldn't give it to her, so she's doing it for herself.

In high school, Wanda had always excelled in courses in the vocational education department.

Now, nearly a decade after graduation, she finds her first ever job as a secretary to the president of the American Hose Specialty Company, which sells supplies used in oil fields across the state.

Now, with a job to look good for and one in Houston, no less, Wanda needs to pay careful attention to her appearance.

And with full control of the purse strings, she can do just that.

She's got a good eye, putting together tasteful, fashionable outfits, and even completes the look with manicured nails and hair that's teased to high heaven.

After getting herself ready every morning, Wanda drops the kids off with her mother.

Verna watches little Shanna and takes Shane to and from school.

When Wanda finishes work, she drives back to Channel View to pick them both up for their extracurriculars.

Because if there's one thing Wanda's sure of, it's that her kids are going to be active and involved.

She loves her parents, but she doesn't agree with all the choices they made.

Who knows?

If they let her be on the drill team, she might not have ended up in her dead-end marriage to Tony.

She's not going to let that happen to her kids.

So she's got Shane on a little league team, and she dresses Shanna up in a pint-sized cheerleader outfit for his games.

It's clear where her head's at for her daughter.

Even when Shanna's not playing the role of cheerleader, she always looks immaculate in pristine dresses, with her blonde curls brushed to 1980s perfection.

Wanda's determined that no one is going to overlook her little girl.

Shanna is going to get all the chances that Wanda never got.

But Wanda doesn't save all her attention for her kids.

She's soon spending time with one of the owners of American Host Company, Gordon Engelhardt.

At 44, Gordon's got about 18 years on Wanda, but he's a good-looking guy and he's wealthy, too, which helps her see past the age gap.

He picks her up in nice cars and takes her to the best restaurants, sometimes even bringing her along when he's entertaining clients.

It's the kind of excitement that's been missing for all of Wanda's life.

Even better than that is Gordon's generosity.

When he and Wanda have been dating for less than a year, he buys her a brand new Mazda RX-7, a $9,000 sports car.

And that's just a preamble to the main event.

In 1981, Gordon proposes, she accepts, and they quickly tie the knot.

After the happy day, Wanda packs up her kids and her life and moves 80 miles east to the city of Beaumont, which is where Gordon's mansion is.

As for her house, Wanda puts it on the market.

Tony's interested in buying it, which makes sense on account of the fact that he built it, and it's right next door to his parents' house.

But Wanda refuses to give her ex what he wants.

So she accepts an offer of $40,000 from someone else, and closes the book on her life in Channelview.

Or so she thinks.

In Beaumont, Wanda seems to have everything she ever wanted.

A nice house, fancy car, handsome husband, great kids.

But it just never feels like everything.

She tries to make it work, but in her eyes, her new husband doesn't make it easy.

Gordon's just never around to spend time with her and the kids.

Never mind that he's working to provide for them all, Wanda wants them home.

What she gets instead is Gordon's mother.

Towards the end of 1982, Gordon moves his mom into one of the spare bedrooms so he can take care of her when she's sick.

But even though Wanda is a lifelong Christian, she doesn't want to spend her time looking after her unwell mother-in-law.

That's not what she signed up for.

Around the same time that Mrs.

Engelhardt moves in, the final straw comes.

There's a downturn in the oil industry, and plenty of businesses across Texas go belly up.

As a company that specifically and exclusively caters to oil fields, American Hose is in a lot of trouble.

And as a co-owner, Gordon's personal finances are suddenly looking a lot less secure than they were a year ago.

He's not broke, but Wanda doesn't want to wait around to see if he gets there.

And so she starts planning her exit.

But Gordon's got no idea that his young wife is unhappy.

It seems like Wanda doesn't want to tell him until absolutely necessary.

He only finds out she's leaving him by accident.

He picks up the phone when an administrator calls the house to confirm that Shane and Shanna are moving back to the Channel View School District.

When Gordon confronts Wanda about the call, she simply tells him that the marriage isn't working.

He's hurt, but he doesn't fight her on it.

He only wants her to be happy.

Things move quickly after that.

The following Saturday, Gordon helps Wanda and the kids pack their stuff.

Then he stands in the driveway, watching as they drive off.

He's as generous in the divorce settlement as he was in the marriage.

Wanda gets to keep her car, the dazzling collection of jewelry he bought her, and a nice chunk of change from Gordon's fortune.

Plus she's got all the clothes she bought on his dime, and the money she got from selling her old house.

So in 1983, 29-year-old Wanda Engelhardt returns to Channel View.

She's wealthier than she's ever been, better dressed too.

And as always, she only wants the best from life, for her and her kids.

And by God, she's gonna get it.

From Airship, this is episode one in our series on Wanda Holloway.

On the next episode, Wanda's quest to make her daughter a cheerleader turns friends into enemies.

We use many different sources while preparing this episode.

A couple we can recommend are Mother Love, Deadly Love by Anne McDonald Mayer and the Texas Monthly article, The Cheerleader Murder Plot by Mimi Schwartz.

This episode may contain reenactments or dramatized details.

And while in some cases, we can't know exactly what happened, all our dramatizations are based on historical research.

American Criminal is hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Jeremy Schwartz.

Audio editing by Mohammed Shahzee.

Sound design by Matthew Filla.

Music by Thrun.

This episode is written and researched by Joel Callan, managing producer Emily Burke.

Executive producers are Joel Callan, William Simpson, and Lindsey Graham.