Transcript of Ride or Die

An all new 2020 starts right now. Good morning, everyone.

It's Friday with our temperature today, a high of about 78. The morning of October second, 2020. We were at a diner here in Carrollton, having our little meeting breakfast with our sergeant.

This was on a Friday, so that was one of our regular days off. I occasionally will work off-duty jobs. I happened to be working at a bank that morning.

I had my very first mammogram ever that morning. You have to put everything in a locker and lock your things up.

It was during that meeting that we got a radio that there was a shooting at the Green tree Apartments in Carrollton, Texas.

I was just down the street from Green tree to get a call from my sergeant. He asked me to come help.

My phone went off. It was a Facebook notification, and the exact words were, Is it true? I just heard about Alyssa. What happened? 911, what is the address of the emergency? It's 11: 20. I need an ambulance immediately. Okay, I'm going to get some help at it that way. Now tell me exactly what happened. Someone came up and just shot my assistant manager. I need someone here immediately. Don't touch anything, okay? This is an active crying scene, okay?

Who all is in here?

Just me and my coworker. We just getting our day started. Okay. I came in at nine o'clock. I was in the computer working, and then Tony comes in around 9: 06. When suddenly we heard a car really close to the parking lot. And we're like, What the hell is he parking like that? And then we just heard a booming sound. You were watering the plants.

Yeah. And then what?. I vi que llegó un carro, y atrás del carro llegó This is a crime scene now.

We got to take it off. The chop, and I say, I'm looking with what happened. Did you hear one child? Only one child. Okay. Is she awake? She's awake. Okay. How old is she? She's 44 years old. Do you know who she is? Yes. She's my sister manager. Okay. So first day. Growing up, she was very headstrong, but she also had the heart of gold. We had our times, right? Like mothers and daughters do. But I can say she's the one who, anytime I needed anything, she was there. I am Alyssa's sister. We're six years apart, I believe. She was always the cooler, older sister that I always looked up to. For my 18th birthday, my mother did this huge party, and she actually got Alyssa to make a video. Hey, Taylor. Happy birthday, 18. Now that you're getting into adulthood, we're going to become best friends, and we're going to make lots of new memories. We can do everything together now that you're older. And so that was really awesome for me at that time. Me and Alyssa became friends in the sixth grade. I was getting bullied. And she asked me to ride the bus home with her, and we were inseparable ever since.

She's always been like a mama bird. She was bold and strong and had to teach me how to stand on my two feet. She gave me by braveness. There was not a room that she could walk in that her presence wouldn't be known. Whenever she got pregnant, it was very out of the blue. She was very scared but determined she was going to go through with it. As soon as her baby came, she was all mom mode. I think that the most beautiful part of Alyssa's life was when she became a mother to Willow. We support her for changing her whole lifestyle for that kid. You have this beautiful 24-year-old mom who is trying to make a life, and just was one of the absolute best moms.

Shortly before 9: 00 AM on October second, Alyssa Burkett pulled into the parking lot of the Green tree Apartments, where she worked as an assistant office manager. She was likely sitting in her car when an assailant dressed in all black, approached her car from the driver's side.

The assailant, he pulled her right here and he got out and he shot her through the driver's side window. And he got back in, started to back out thinking that he had done his job. I heard that pop.

I turned around, I knew it was a gunshot. So I was like, what the fuck? So I turned around, I peaked out the window, I a Ford Explorer. It's like a black, navy blue, something like that.

There is a video that is inside that shows the leasing office, and it shows the two coworkers that were here.

We dig down me and Tony. We got down, and then we ran to the other window to take a close look of the truck, and I noticed it was a black one, and he was dressed everything in black, everything. The bastard came out. He was trying to pull away when I saw him. He knew that I saw him, so he tried to run off after he popped there.

They hear the gunshot, and then they're trying to figure out what to do.

Me, we ran. I was like, he's going to try to do something to us. So I ran and I told him to call the cops. He tried to go into his car. He was pulling out, but he noticed that she stepped out, so she was still trying to live..

So she was shot, and then she comes out of her vehicle?

He realized that Alyssa had gotten out. She was fighting to get into the leasing office where she knew her coworkers were. He stops, sees her, comes back, runs out with a knife.

The suspect got out of his vehicle, followed her up here along this path.

Drops the sheath over here on the sidewalk. And then catches up to her on the stoop of the leasing office where he proceeded to stab her multiple times.

Hey, guys, I'm going to start taking stuff off. Did you see him holding the knife?

Yeah, in the hand.

You saw him holding the knife? Yeah. We couldn't help her, obviously. He strapped, What the hell am I going to do? So then I wanted to call the police. Where is the shooter? He's gone. He left in his car. Okay, how long ago did he leave? He literally left a second ago. Okay, did he leave in a vehicle? Yes, he left in a vehicle. What's the color and type of vehicle? Do you know? It's just a black for a native one. I didn't get a good look at it. Was she shot in the chest or in-In her arm. In her arm? I can't tell. It's run all over the place.

How badly was she wounded?

.

She was still breathing.

Is she still conscious or has she gone completely unconscious at this point? She looks unconscious, but she's fired. As I'm coming back out to get my things, my phone is just ringing nonstop, and I'm like, What is going on? It was my supervisor calling. She's like, I'm calling about Alyssa, and you need to go to Green tree.

According to the witnesses, nobody actually saw it happen. They just heard the pop.

It was just call after call after call. I got a phone call. It was my friend, and all she said was he stabbed her. I said, who? What's going on? And then I remember her saying she was shot.

You went that way? It's a flat guy, right?

It's a flat guy. It was really just a scramble of trying to figure out what happened and who did it.

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Get tickets now. October second. Unfortunately, it is the day that I replay a lot. The whole world was spinning. I felt my heart break that day. I remember pulling up. I see all of the lights, the ambulance, the police. And I remember asking, She didn't make it, did she? And he was like, No, she didn't. And then I remember just losing it from that move on. Oh my God. I just didn't want it to be true that Alyssa had died, and that they didn't know where Willa was.

We're in the parking lot of the Green tree Apartments. This is where we were for the murder investigation of Alyssa Burkett. When I arrived, it was the most brutal scene I think I'd ever been to. You could just see the rage and the hate that was in the killer's mind and heart. Don't touch anything.

This is an active crime scene.

We knew we had a lot of evidence. We had Alyssa's car. That was a crime scene in and of We also collected the knife sheath that was here on the sidewalk. Sheath of a knife, laying over here in front of the car. That the suspect had dropped. We heard a pop. We want to talk to everybody that's on scene. You all come with me, please. Were you here when everything happened? Yes. All the witnesses had very similar descriptions. He come out right there and he was a kid of the car, black car, like a SUV car.

Black SUV back up and stop.

The one consistent thing that I remember is them describing him as an African-American male with a beard.

It was a look like a black guy. I see the face, black guy. Alyssa had this feeling that someone was watching her. After Alyssa's murdered and the police are examining her car, they find a tracker.

It seemed like there was something else that we were missing pretty early on, and we were. It's murder 101. I mean, you always start with the closest circle to that victim. Then you work out.

Alyssa Alyssa had told me that she had met someone, that they had been dating a little bit. When we met, I just thought, Okay, he seems like he's this nice guy, and okay, we're good to go.

Alyssa and Andrew met online in 2018. He was 10 years older than her, and he told me on the phone that at the time they met, he was well-established. He owned his own house, he had a great job selling power tools, and he even owned his own airplane.

She seemed like a very caring, funny, loving person.

Andrew wanted eventually to settle down and have children. He was this warm, giving, loving man that put others first. I knew that she was seeing someone, and it wasn't like anything serious. And then she found out that she was pregnant with Willow.

I just asked her straight up, Okay, well, do you want to go look at a place and move in? And she looked like she was very relieved for that. I said, Okay, well, let's do that.

They found a beautiful home on the lake in a suburb of Dallas. He envisioned that they would raise their daughter there. I know she felt very uncomfortable about it. I was like, Well, are you going to move in there with him? And she was like, Well, the deal was that he was going to help her go to school and all of these things. Everything had to be on his terms and his way. And she was just like, No, this is not the deal for me. And I don't want to do that. Which is why she moved out two weeks later. When Willow was born, he was at the hospital.

Holding Willow was probably one of the most fulfilling moments. From the beginning, we absolutely had the full understanding that we're just going to be co-parenting.

She wanted it to be fair. She wanted him to have time with Willow, a relationship with him. So that's what she agreed to. She was always team co-parent, and if we can be civil, that's in in the best interests of Willow. After they had come to this agreement in mediation, everything was fine. All right. And then Holly came into the picture. Willow, get your fishies. That's when everything went south.

I've loved two women in my life, and Holly was in front of them.

Holly is a big personality, exudes energy and passion. A turtle. A turtle. Their relationship was really intense because it was COVID, and they were spending 20 before seven together from the moment they met.

She was jumping into almost like a stepmother role. It seemed like right off the bat.

Andrew and Holly met with Alyssa and her guy, and it was all very amiable and very, Gosh, why wouldn't we just get along? Let's do that. Andrew seemed to like some of the things he was hearing, but Holly didn't.

She really took that as her launching point to tell Andrew, Look, you got to be a man about this, almost belittling him on a routine basis.

What started off as an amicable co-parenting scenario quickly turned into a bitter custody battle.

I always tell people that Alyssa had a really bright light, and then all of a sudden, her light was gone. Something was wrong.

I had worked a case a month before for an anonymous drug tip that involved Alyssa. The drug tip came from here at Green tree.

911, what is the location of your emergency?

I'd like to report someone selling drugs in my apartment complex, also doing them. The call seemed very unusual to me. This was very specific. It was Alyssa Burkett It was marijuana.

It was hand-to-hand transactions. Where they did find drugs in the truck of her car.

Just a box with some marijuana, a little bit of money, and a gun. Ms. Burkett insisted that she had never seen that before.

Shockingly, there's no fingerprints whatsoever. The pistol, the serial number was etched out.

It was always something not right with this call.

She's scared to death at this point. It's like, What is next. One month after that 911 call, Alyssa would be dead.

I was there when we get word that Theresa was on scene, and she's in so much pain, and she's so angry. She knew about the anonymous drug tip a month prior.

I knew that it was him when the drugs didn't work in the car for him to get the baby. She even said, I think he's the person that's going to try to kill me. And he did. And he did. Oh, my God.

She was screaming at Sandra, knowing that from the witness's account, that it was a black male that we're looking for. In the back of my mind, it wasn't really adding up.

While police are talking to Alyssa's mother. They find out that Andrew had custody of Baby Willow that day.

I want my great baby away from you.

Do you know what car he drives?

He has a whiteboard truck.

My brother, something's happened. So there are people right now that would like to talk to you. Like freaking out.

What is going on?

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Andrew and Holly live together at the Flamingo address in Rowlett.

We had Rowlett Pee Dee out here to survey the house while we had our own resources in route and Detective John Meyer and Matt Burnham.

The call we got, they said they saw Andrew and Holly leaving and possibly had the luggage with them.

We happened to be pulling onto the street at the exact at the same time that Andrew's truck was coming head on to us. So Matt hit the lights on his truck. We were in an unmarked covered vehicle. Andrew came to a stop. We had them exit the vehicle separately. All right, take a seat.

Sit right there.

So I'll talk to you about what's going on here in one second. My brother, something's happened right now. That's why we're here. I can't go into the details on what it is, but it's pretty significant. So there are people right now that would like to talk to you. Would you mind going? I'm really poor, but I mind going to the coffee. I'm freaking out.

What do you mean? I'll be honest, do I need an attorney for this? Or what is going on?

When the police pull over Andrew, they don't tell him that Alyssa has been murdered. And the body cams are rolling, and he doesn't seem too surprised, but also doesn't seem too edgy.

Hey, Mark, do they have a kid?

I knew that he had just gotten Willow from Alyssa, and I'm thinking she is in danger, and we need to go get her. We all knew he had an airplane. That was a huge concern, is that he was going to take off on that airplane, and we'd never see the baby ever again. After we got Holly and Andrew out of the car, and I observed that Willow, the daughter, was in her car seating the back seat of the pickup.

Yes, the daughter's in car seating the back seat.

The AC is on and everything? Yeah, I can go double check now. She has her bottle. She should be okay.

Andrew and Holly had said they'd been at the house. They were relaxing all morning.

We were just going to brunch. Tlc on the way. Okay. What in the world?

Holly was overly cooperative, too.

I asked for consent to search her purse because she wanted some stuff out of it. I just need my small little Louis Vuitton bag.

She was like, Oh, yeah, go ahead. Can we leave your passport in the truck? Is that cool? Because obviously, you're not going out of the country No, I just got back from Mexico a couple of days ago, actually.

I'm not leaving the country, so as long as I can have it back in the near-Yeah, you'll get it back eventually.

Yeah, it's going to be in the truck. We're not taking it.

I was in Granite Bay in California, and I get a call from Holly. And she goes, Andrew and I got pulled over, and it was horrible. They pulled guns, and I was like, What?

I'm taking your phone and her phone right now. But I will allow you to call the attorney, take it. Take it. And then if you can leave here and just go straight to the Carrollton Police Department and they'll advise you.

They were just trying to do everything they could to try to get them back to the PD for an interview. So so that we can get them in a room and talk to them, figure out what they knew, see if there's anything that would lead us down to a suspect.

We asked for consent to search the vehicle at the scene, and Andrew told us we couldn't search the truck, but we had enough developments coming from the crime scene to get a search warrant for the truck. How about going to the Raleigh Police Department?

I would rather just wait for my mom to put my lady to say, You're not going in your house, okay?

You're telling me I'm not allowed in my house? Because we're about to run the search warrant.

We told them that they weren't allowed to go back to the house. They wanted to keep it where no one came in and no one went out.

The decision was made. He's not leaving with the truck. If he wants to go, they can go to the police Department.

Yeah, they just meant to say, They just knew that's fine.

So we see Andrew and Holly leaving with Willow, carrying her in her car seat, and they go to get an Uber because they can't go home.

The order was given to us. Like, Hey, stay with Andrew. Make sure that they don't throw anything out of the car. And as we're traveling, they take an exit that we weren't expecting. It was at that point, the attorney was on the phone.

So I don't know if something serious is going on.

And they said that we have to go careful.

They say I can't go home.

Yes, ma'am.

It seems very good. That was going on. Yeah, I can guess what's going on. He's baby mama is mad, and she's now made some false complaints against him again.

I'll be completely honest with you. Baby Mama was murdered this morning at her work.

Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Andrew and Holly had originally agreed to come to the police Department to speak to us. And somewhere along the way, he decided he wasn't going to do that anymore.

They never went to the police station. They went to an Airbnb. They had nothing. They had no change of clothes or anything for Willow.

We knew where they were, we knew where Willow was, but we couldn't take Willow.

I feel like that was a dangerous person, and they knew it at that point, and why would they have left her? Yeah, I was upset.

Our next goal now is we still have the house, so we write up a search warrant, which ultimately gets signed by a judge.

That same night, officers go inside Andrew and Holly's house.

Carole to Police Department, Search Warrant.

If you're in there, come out with your hands up.

We probably have no less than six detectives there. And we go through the house room by room by room.

I got up top, Claire. There's a hallway to the right there.

One of the first things that we do find was a diamonds direct envelope that had a receipt for an engagement ring that I presume was for Holly. But on the back of that envelope was basically the script for the drug tip.

Written on that envelope, all the details the caller needed to make that false accusation against Alyssa.

Alyssa's The license plate's on here, the address for the green tree and other information that was needed to make that call. Once we saw that, it was like, Okay, we're on the right path.

The room was a spare bedroom that was full of junk, had heaps of clothes on the bed, all kinds of stuff.

One of us found a box for a tracker inside that room. These are the tracker boxes and charging stations that we found in one of the bedrooms at Andrew Beard's house. These were identical to the ones that we were able to find under the cars. We didn't find the gun that we were looking for, but what we did find was what came to be a homemade silencer.

We started getting the puzzle pieces together.

After police are done searching Andrew's home, they start canvassing the area, and they find this black Ford Expedition condition that looks a lot like the vehicle that the killer was driving.

We all rushed over to this area, and that's when we found the black Expedition parked along the side of the road up here.

Witnesses reported seeing a black man driving away in that type of vehicle. But things aren't always what they see.

When we searched that vehicle, that was the mother load of evidence. Didn't find much in Holly's car, but we found a nice bunch of Easter eggs in Andrew's vehicle.

We found Willow's diaper bag. Inside were several trash bags, and each one were boots that had been cut up and then doused with bleach.

The other things we found in that bag were these dark Java a colored makeup vials.

And inside that abandoned black SUV, they find one last piece of the puzzle.

This is the beard that we found in the vehicle. This also had DNA from Andrew as well as Alyssa on it. You can actually still see that discoloration from the makeup on the beard. I immediately thought, well, there's our African-American male. I'd never seen someone go to that length to try to paint themselves to look like another race.

I will say between the truck and the expedition in the treasure trove that was found there, it was overwhelming.

It was just small pieces of that puzzle that came together.

All along, it was Andrew in disguise, wearing dark makeup and a beard.

The ham of some of the things that they did is just so buffoonish. The judge signed the warrant for Andrew's arrest for the murder of Alyssa Burkett. We arranged for Andrew to surrender here at the Carrollton Police Department, and he did that mid-afternoon, I think. Hi, how are you doing? Andrew. Yes, sir. Come on back, bud.

I just knew. Okay, well, the police are going to give me any minute.

In my mind, this isn't real. My son would not do this. I remember one of the female law enforcement ladies saying, You don't know your son. It turns out that there's a chunk in there that I couldn't possibly have known.

He thought he could beat this up until the day that he decided, I can't beat this. I think that's why Holly came in the day or so after Andrew's arrest. She was using that opportunity to come and get what we had on Andrew. I believe that he told you something and then told you, Don't tell the police that I was gone for a few hours this morning.

He did not.

We have video all over the neighborhood and all over the neighborhood to the north.

Then why can't you show me?

Because I'm not going to show you all that.

It's our investigation. It's our case. We would talk to her about her relationship with Andrew, and she's very adamant. She says, Andrew would never do this. He's not that type of person.

I don't believe Andrew is capable of murdering someone.

I'm offering you-I just don't. I will walk you down the road and show you the photos of why I know he's a murderer.

I don't want to see violent things.

Then you don't care. Then you don't care to know the truth.

I do want to know the truth.

You don't if you're shutting this out.

It's only because I am prone to anxiety and panic attacks and things like that. So if I get in a certain frantic way, I'm just concerned about my own actual condition.

With Holly not providing much information and police worried that Andrew might be a flight risk, they set his bail at $1 million dollars.

So while Andrew is locked up in jail, Holly and Andrew's mom become super close. In fact, the two of them are living together at this point. Holly and I were linked arms, we're never leaving each other's side. This is terrible. I was genuinely afraid. Holly is living with Andrew's mother for a short period of time, and then she decides to pack up and go back home to Michigan. I said, Holly, Andrew's coming here tomorrow. Don't you want to be here? And she said, My dad really needs me. She left and never came back. And that told me so much.

When Andrew bonded out, it surprised me, but it also concerned us because he's got the means and ability to get out of town if he had to.

So the police contacted attacked the FBI because when they searched Andrew's home, they found this unregistered silencer. And the FBI says, You know what? That's something that we can charge on federally.

That gave me some hope that we were going to be able to get him back into custody.

Police discover that those GPS trackers found in Alyssa's car, technically, they've been operating across state lines. So prosecutors pursue the federal charge of cyber stalking resulting in death and discharging a firearms.

You think, well, yeah, he put a tracker on a car, right? But did they ever leave Texas? Luckily for us, bad for them, is that the company, Spybot, was based out of Florida. And so servers and all that stuff was out of Florida.

With Andrew's case now turned over to the feds, he's re-arrested on those charges, ensuring that he cannot bond out again. The state murder charge is dropped. And as for Holly Elkins, she's no longer the supportive fiancée.

It was a bit expected because when she was asking for money for some house project while I'm in the midst of this, that's when I realized you're not really worrying about what I got going on right now.

I spoke to Andrew Beard from behind bars. This is the first time he's speaking out about the case. Your mother supported you the whole time. When you decide to plea guilty and you had to call her, what was that conversation like?

I called my mom with the plea agreement in front of me, and I told her that I'm guilty, and I am guilty, and she didn't even comprehend that.

It seemed surreal. And he said the reason that he held out so long was because he didn't want to disappoint me. And he just... He had such regret, and not, as you would think, regret for being caught. He had regret about doing what he did to the mother of his child and to his child.

Your mother thought that if you had seen her the weekend before this happened, you would not have gone through with Oh, hands down, there's no way it would have happened.

But I hate telling her that because then she feels like she has some responsibility that if only she had just come for her normal visit like usual.

He was wanting to do a plea deal, and I was in shock because I just thought he would take this to his grave.

With Andrew pleading guilty to all charges, there would be no trial. He received a sentence of 43 years.

43 years. I'll be dead. Everybody He tries to tell me he'll never walk out of there, but he might. I mean, I won't be here, but Willow will be. I don't want her to have to worry about that.

But it's not case closed. Andrew then reveals to investigators that there's a whole lot more to this story.

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This call is from a federal prison. This call is from...

Andrew Beard.

Hello, Andrew. Yes, sir. It's John Quineones from 2020. How are you doing, sir? I'm good. How are you doing?

I'm in prison, so I'm doing as good as you can for that, I guess.

You have a specific reason to talk to us, and thank you for doing that. But what is that reason?

For me, it was really just for obvious reasons. I've never spoken to the media or the news. And so the story just went completely one direction. I've taken full responsibility and just wanted to basically say, Hey, look, this has started from custody issues.

Andrew, this was quite the leap from, I want custody of my daughter to, I'm going to kill her mother.

John, it's because you I feel you need to know the whole story. I'm not trying to attempt to disparage Alyssa's memory, but yeah, I had growing concerns from my daughter's well-being and whereabouts.

Did you initially have concerns about committing this crime, killing her?

Oh, I'd absolutely. It goes against the laws of God, nature, and man.

Tell me about that morning. What happened?

For a while, that morning was very hazy. Basically, just going to complete this final thing that needed to get done, and everything would be better. That was That was the thought in my mind.

In my conversation with Andrew, he was vague about what drove him to kill Alyssa. But as part of his plea deal, he detailed to prosecutors what he says led up to this is death.

I say you didn't plan on shooting, but I mean...

No, again, I know what you're saying, man.

Don't get me wrong.

Every plan was eventually, yes, you're going to then commit this crime.

He gave a full accounting of everything from the beginning until the very end. Holly was the driver in my mind. We talked about the joking sprinkled in of, It would be so much easier if you just offer, situation.

And then it was, Well, we're going to plant these drugs.

And then now all this thing happened..

What was Holly's role in all of this?

She was basically the mastermind behind it all. She clearly was leading me down the path. Anytime I would try to pull back from that path, she would make sure I stayed on it. The end goal was custody and to just be a family.

You tried to conceal your identity by using dark makeup. Do you think that was a good plan?

No, I thought the whole plan was ridiculous.

But you did it.

Yeah, I did. I did it. So the plan that was made was to dark makeup and make me look not white and to truly commit the crime. And that way, in her words, even And if they see you, it would be somebody else.

He explained how he and Holly got involved. He walked us through the details about how they devised this plan to smear Alyssa. And when that didn't work, the plan was hatched to actually murder her.

I saw a growing need from Holly that she wanted Willow to basically be her child. And that's all well and good, except there's a loving mother involved.

One text I found that I forgot to tell you guys about was she had specifically told me on the 25th, I hope you handled it. I'm not coming home to BS right now. And she said, this will be a whole different conversation if you ride or die, if you prove that you ride or die situation.

And your interpretation of ride or die was what?

Of ride or die 100 % meant that I'd be willing to commit a crime for her.

Andrew points the finger at Holly, but the FBI needs to corroborate that what he's saying is true. So they need to look at the digital footprint of the communications between Holly and Andrew. They need to look at emails, text messages, and where their phones were pinging.

There was a ton of digital evidence. Not only did we have computers from Andrew and Holly, we also had their cell phones. That's where the majority of the digital evidence came from that was used in the investigation.

Investigators say they later uncovered archived search histories on Holly's computer, including queries for spy store and GPS tracker. Three years after Alyssa's death, authorities finally charged Holly Elkins. They arrested her at the Miami airport while she was returning home from vacation.

The arrest of Holly Elkins came as a shock.

It's bittersweet.

It brings up all the hurt of the loss, but we're glad that she's being held accountable for it.

Count one, she was charged with stalking. Count two, conspiracy to stalk.

Holly Elkins pled not guilty to all charges.

We always knew that Holly had something to do with it. It was awesome that they finally got her and that they had gotten all the evidence that they did have against her.

She was not hiding. She was carrying on her life by traveling and doing everything that she wanted to do. I think she thought that this had passed and that she wasn't real concerned about it. I like to think that there was that little part in the back of her mind that kept bugging her about, Man, I wonder if they're going to come after me. I wonder if they're going to find me.

While in prison, you come forward to police about Holly.

Yes, sir.

Why did you do that?

It was the right thing to do. I actually had a conversation with my attorney, and he had told me something that hit home pretty hard. What about the next guy, Andrew? He said, You know, this is... You take this fall, but the next one would be on you.

And now, Holly Elkins heads to trial.

Elkins says she was aware that Beard and Burkett were in a bitter custody battle over their child, but denies helping him. I just couldn't believe some of the things that I had heard. Prosecutors used phone records and online purchase history to link Holly Elkins to the 2020 shooting and stabbing death of Alyssa Burkett.

The prosecution in this case had everything at their disposal. They had every tool in the shed, and they used them all.

Elkins says she was aware that Beard and Burkett were in a bitter custody battle over their child, but denies helping him. Holly Elkins defense was this was a custody fight, and it wasn't her that did this. It wasn't her who pushed him and prodded him.

Elkins' attorneys disputed that she was part of the drug planting on Alyssa's vehicle or that she had anything to do with the GPS tracking devices found on the car. They rejected the argument that Holly was the mastermind in Alyssa's killing.

The woman who plotted the attack was convicted after brief jury deliberations. I was so relieved, Even though I felt like we were going to get the guilty verdict, I just was worried about the jury putting it all together because it's so much. I do feel like in a way, justice was served. I mean, he got 43 years and Holly got life. I'm happy with it.

You have a message for Alyssa's family? I do.

I'm so sorry for my despicable and downright evil actions. Alyssa was an inspiring young woman. She deserved so much more from life. I give myself for taking I got away from you, and I know there's nothing I can say or do that will fix what I broke.

I don't think it was genuine. I think if you're going to take someone's life, you'll never truly be sorry for anything. You can say to me, as many stories as you want, it's never going to be enough or remorseful to me. There's been times where I'm like, Okay, yeah, I'll forgive him one day. But then in my heart, do I really? And you have to, I guess, just to be able to move forward. It will never be okay what they did. But just for my own self and soul, I have to forgive that and let that go.

Your message to your daughter?

Willow, my sweet baby girl, you instantly became our world. I'm sorry for letting you down the way I did. Maybe one day you can forgive me for that. But I love you with every inch of my heart. I truly do.

Andrew has not had any contact with his daughter, Willow. However, when she turns 18, she will be given the choice, the opportunity to reach out to him if she wants to. Willow is now my daughter. The adoption is finalized. They are a spitting image of each other. Even the way Willow walks, when she turns around and walks off, I see Alyssa walking off. It is just they're that identical. We're going to become best friends, and we're going to make lots of new memories. And I love you. Now that I'm a mother myself, I look at myself all the time and think, What would Alyssa tell me to do about this situation? Alyssa is watching us. Alyssa gave me this baby. She told me I'm ready to be a mom just like she was.

That's our program for tonight. Thanks for watching. I'm Deborah Roberts. And I'm David Muir from all of us at 2020 in ABC News. Good night. My name is Percy Jackson.

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