This is a bonus episode available to TM Audio subscribers only. Connect access to your TM Audio feed to the podcast player of your choice here. To troubleshoot any issues, access the FAQ here. Read the transcript below.
For our first bonus episode for Texas Monthly audio subscribers, we’re sharing an extended cut of the undercover audio Red recorded for the FBI, as he tried to get Adam Carey and Bryon Brockway to talk about the murders of Bill Lanway and Holly Williams. Red, you’ll recall, is the alias we used in the show for one of the security operatives hired by Erik Maund, who left Nashville before the murders took place.
This episode was produced by Ella Kopeikin. Executive producer is Megan Creydt. The show is reported and written by Katy Vine and written, produced, and reported by Ana Worrel. It was produced and engineered by Brian Standefer, who also wrote the music. Story editing and production by Patrick Michels. Additional production by Aisling Ayers. Additional editing by Karen Olsson. Fact-checking by Jaclyn Colletti. Studio musicians are Jon Sanchez, Glenn Fukunaga, and Pat Mansky. Artwork is by Emily Kimbro and Victoria Millner.
Transcript
Agent Som: Date is September 21st, 2021. In the room is Patrick Cuthbertson, SA David Som…
Adam Carey: What’s up, man?
Red: Hey, what’s up, dude? How you been?
Adam Carey: Good, how are you?
Red: Oh, not bad.
Katy Vine (voice-over): I’m Katy Vine and this is The Problem with Erik, an original podcast created by Texas Monthly and Ana Worrel.
Red: Well, if you have a second, we’re just going to kind of run by, run you through this little thing.
As a Texas Monthly audio subscriber, you’re getting exclusive access to bonus episodes along with the show. And this is the first one: an extended cut of the undercover audio Red recorded for the FBI.
In the next few weeks, you’ll also hear my conversation with an expert on contract killers, who’ll help us answer that question Salem talked about in the Shithole: Were Adam and Bryon really hit men? And how common is murder-for-hire work like this?
You’ll also get a behind-the-scenes look at the show, where our lead producer Ana Worrel and I will talk about how we reported the story, and answer questions from listeners.
But first, I wanted to share with you a few more moments from Red’s taped conversations with Adam and Bryon, as he tried to get them talking about the murders.
Red, you’ll recall, isn’t his real name. And in the fall of 2021, he agreed to help the FBI gather evidence that led to the arrests of Adam Carey, Bryon Brockway, Gil Peled, and finally Erik Maund.
Let’s start with a call you’re familiar with already, between Red and Adam Carey in September 2021. Remember, to get these guys talking, Red was pretending to plan a new murder for hire similar to the Nashville job. He said he was asking for advice.
Here, Adam Carey explains the evolution of the plan that led to the deaths of Holly Williams and Bill Lanway. He starts by describing his initial meeting with Gil Peled, who acted as a middleman for Erik Maund.
Adam Carey: So we had a cut through or we could technically call him a liaison and he knew the client and he did all the face-to-face stuff and he was former Mossad, and that guy is really close to the one buddy that was with me.
Red: Okay.
Adam Carey: And so when he was like, “Yes, it’s a go,” there was no doubt. You know what I’m saying?
Red: I see. Now, in your opinion, do you think we had too many people on the ground or should have been less?
Adam Carey: I mean, if we’re just straight doing SR, that’s a pretty decent number depending on how deep we want to go and how active they are.
Red: Right.
Adam Carey: If they’re moving a lot, obviously you know just as well as I do f—ing, we’ll need more people to do follows and shifts and rotations, but if they’re not moving a lot, we could cut it back to the two, three. And if we’re going to do, and again, once we have a POL, that will actually dictate how many guys we truly need.
Red: Right.
Adam Carey: If you’re cool with it, I think we could get away with just four of us because, we bring, all four of us bring a lot to the table, and I don’t know if you have guys that you could a hundred percent trust, like I’ll get on the stand and lie for these f—ing dudes . . . Okay. And what I would recommend is, if there’s a not before date and a no later than date, that’s a good, the more time the better because then we don’t all have to be congested and we can figure out a little bit more of living situations of maybe doing a KOA and putting a camper or something on it that doesn’t require names and s—. That way no one’s name is on a hotel. And then we can factor out, we need upfront cash for travel expenses and tools and food, naturally. And if they’re willing to do an upfront cost, then you know, have a good source anyway. And that doesn’t even have to be extremely high . . . And then let’s say an upfront cost of at least fifty to get things rolling, or even twenty. Twenty to thirty to pay everyone to start collecting or just pay you. You get materials together and then okay, it’s a go and then payment upon completion.
Red: Okay.
The day after that initial call with Adam, Red called Bryon Brockway.
Agent Som: Date is Wednesday, September 22nd, time is 2:37 p.m. Those present in the room are Detective Patrick Cuthbertson, SA David Som, making a call to Bryon Brockway.
Again, the FBI was recording.
Red: Planning as far is in the infancy stages right now. The client, it’s not like ASAP, but there is probably some time constraints, mid-October is probably going to be his, I don’t want to say absolute latest, but probably in that timeframe. I’m just trying to get a rough plan together, but I know you ran the show for the last thing, so I had a couple of questions because I want to pretty much be in your seat for this one.
Bryon Brockway: Yeah, of course, man. I’ll help you out any way I can, man. Just let me know.
Red kicks things off talking about Gil.
Red: Specifically dealing with, I guess. I’ll say the middleman on the last one. Was there any issues there? Because I’m in the same boat, I’m trying to vet this guy a little bit before I commit.
Bryon Brockway: Man, I’m sorry. Well, which last one are we talking about?
Red: Nashville.
Bryon Brockway: So man, unfortunately that one’s all last minute, one hundred percent, and I don’t know how to explain it, man. If I could have changed it, I definitely would’ve loved to have a hell lot more planning. But it sounds like you have more planning, so I don’t think it should be an issue, honestly. And being the middleman, you really don’t have to have hands on so. . .
Red: No, I didn’t mean like me being the middleman, I meant that dude that was in the middle of . . . That random dude that was friends, or whatever, or close to the client.
Bryon Brockway: Oh, I see what you’re saying. Oh, okay, okay, okay. I’m tracking now, buddy. So that guy, I’ve known him for a long time and he was with prior agencies and everything else and is super easy to vet him and clear him, only because I’ve known him for a while and I don’t know who your middle man is and how you would trust him or go about it. I mean, honestly, he could be taken a lot from you and you would never know.
Red: Right. And that’s kind of my concern. I want to make sure, obviously since you knew, what was it? Was it Gil? I think that was his name?
Bryon Brockway: Right, right, yup.
Red: Yeah, I feel like, given that you guys were close, there was that easy familiarity and you had that communication, but I’d rather skip the middleman if I can, and just go direct with the client. After I left, I don’t know if Gil is the one who gave you guys a green light, or if it was the client himself. I just don’t want to get caught up in any convolution as far as directions from client to middleman to me, how that game of telephone can go.
Bryon Brockway: Yeah, I know. That’d be tough, man. I don’t actually know who gave the green light, man.
Red: And I was mostly just trying to, as vague as possible, just pick his brain about how things went after I left, and just if there were any big lessons learned, pros, cons, just because since I’m the planning end at this time, I’m just trying to start to get a semblance of a plan together to present to the client.
Bryon Brockway: I got you.
Red: So I don’t know if you had any big takeaways or do-overs if you were to do it again, if there was something that we could incorporate. He had a couple of good tips that I’m kind of building in, but I don’t know if you had anything off the top of your head that you could provide.
Bryon Brockway: Not right off, unfortunately, it is all last minute. Hurry up and try and get as much intel or as CSCI as possible and then hand it over to the client so they know what’s going on. Unfortunately, didn’t give us a big window to collect everything that we f—ing needed, but it is what it is, man. Last-minute crap, man. We gave him what we had. That’s all we f—ing got for him. And then after that, that’s on them.
Red: Right on.
About a month later, Red and Bryon followed up in person, with a meeting at a brewery in Austin. It’s noisy, with the sounds of background chatter and kids playing . . . but you can make out Red asking Bryon about payment for this possible new job.
If you’d like to follow along with what they say, we’ve got a link to the transcript in the show notes.
Red: This isn’t like negotiation. If I can get that off the table right now, we’re not gonna go . . . So I was like, “Once I talk to the guys, if they’re in then we’ll give you a dollar amount. That’s enough. Then it’s in your court. You can say yes or no after that but we’re not going to f— around with the dollars.”
Bryon Brockway: No, no.
Red: So we’re going to tell you what it is. Then it’s up to you.
Bryon Brockway: And the only way we can justify it is we’re f—ing proficient as f— dude. We’re not f—ing amateurs.
Red: Right.
Bryon Brockway: And we’re not going to f—ing invoice and little f—ing bulls— afterwards. It’s just one f—ing-
Red: Yeah. Yep.
Bryon Brockway: So with that, you always have to f—ing try and sell two people. It’s always so much f—ing better. . .
Bryon Brockway: Oh, if he’s got the dollars . . . You know that more than I do man, f—ing push it up then, man, start high, then f—ing come down low. Like the others, they have the f—ing dollars, but there’s multiple people. So they’re going to come out pretty f—ing good in terms of f—ing charging sixty, multiple f—ing times. We’re not that greedy.
And again, Red tries to get Bryon talking about Gil.
Red: How that went last time, and I was like, I felt like there was a little bit of miscommunication in the middle. . . not between you.
Bryon Brockway: There was, man, with the one guy.
Red: The what?
Bryon Brockway: The one guy, the middleman, which separates the client from everybody else, which is good. You got to have them.
Red: Sure.
Bryon Brockway: I don’t know if you’re direct or. . .
Red: Yeah.
Bryon Brockway: The only way he was able to do that, because the middle guy was the direct contact with him and they were trusted and I trusted him, because I know his rep.
You’ll remember, after talking in the bar for a while, Bryon and Red continued the conversation in Bryon’s car.
Bryon Brockway: Reassess the situation. I couldn’t have done it without him. Went to the original dump site after we got everything closed, rolled down, cleaned up so we’re not looking like f—ing gangsters or anything, man.
Red: Sure. I mean, I would like. . . Yeah, no, I think two and one overwatch is ideal. The complication of the vehicle, I mean, that’s a great lesson learned, because that was actually one of the things I was thinking about doing, was doing vehicular. But if you’re saying that was s— last time, then. . .
Bryon Brockway: Mobile is good, man. If you do it like a static, take all f—ing purse, wallet, identification, robbery. . .
Red: Oh sure.
Bryon Brockway: And then f—ing leave. That’s fine too, man. No matter what, they’re going to f—ing be discovered. Let me know. F—ing I trust you, man.
Red brings up Adam and how things in Nashville snowballed, but Bryon doesn’t bite.
Red: Which is fine. I’m cool. I mean, you got to learn. You got to cut your teeth somewhere. I think, I felt like he was a little overzealous about a couple things but I was like . . . He kept rogering up like, “I’ll do this. I’ll do that.” I was like, ”Do you know what you’re getting yourself into here?” That’s kind of a bold move to say out loud. You know?
Bryon Brockway: Yeah.
Red: And then he went pretty comms dark after I left because I don’t know f—ing anything after that. I thought it was just kind of–
Bryon Brockway: Well–
Red: I thought we were going to hit the pause button, just because it kind of came to. . . We kind of hit the brakes on it. We couldn’t really take it any further. He already knew our faces, so I was like, “Leaving makes sense.” So I was actually surprised when he alluded to what had happened. I was like, “F— dude, we were all over that place.”
Bryon Brockway: You’ll be the lead on this one, man.
Red: Okay. Yeah, just let us know, man. You guys turned off whatever you f—ing turned on, f—ing, you got me in your pocket.
But then, a month after their face to face, Red made another call to Bryon. This time, Bryon opened up more about Adam.
Bryon Brockway: Sorry for the f—ing lack of comms and getting back to you, man, there’s been a lot of huge, heavy f—ing weighing. And a lot of s— f—ing going into it, thinking about it, f—ing calculations and f—ing dates mostly. Mostly on my side, not on our buddy’s side, but he’s… Yes, dude, I f—ing love, Adam, he’s f—ing hilarious, man. He’s such a young kid. So f—ing bright, so f—ing eager to f—ing get some man and he’s not an idiot, he’s super f—ing smart man. He’ll follow me to my f—ing grave, and I’m still not too sure why, but it is what it is.
Red: Yeah.
Red had talked with Bryon about working on this new job—which, of course, was all make-believe anyway. But now, it sounded like Bryon was having misgivings.
Bryon Brockway: I love f—ing helping out people, man. I mean because everybody gets in a shitty situation, and I want to be there to f—ing help them whenever they need it. But s—, I don’t want to get f—ing abandoned by my own family at the same time.
Red: No, dude. No, I get it, man. No worries.
Bryon Brockway: Yeah, dude, I’m sure your client’s cool as f— and he’s a good dude, and he just needs to get rid of his f—ing situation, man.
Red: No, of course. Yeah. And that’s the thing, if I . . .
Bryon Brockway: It’s kind of hard to, man. You’ve got a f—ing background, I have the background. We know the f—ing same people. I f—ing trust you to that point. We really never f—ing worked together, except one time. Has anybody f—ing hit you up ever since then after that?
Red: No. No, I haven’t been hit up, have you?
Bryon Brockway: No, not at all, man. But right now, that’s the main issue between our boy and myself. Does that make sense, man?
Red: I mean, yeah, I guess. I mean. . .Why, did he get hit up?
Bryon Brockway: No, not at all. But there was a couple of front door exposures there.
Red: Oh, yeah, I know. I saw the pics.
As you already heard in the show, Bryon had a suspicion about this new job Red brought up, and how similar it was to Nashville. But he kept on talking.
Bryon Brockway: So that’s the only thing that’s f—ing holding us back, if that makes sense, man. Dude, I hate to f—ing tell any of my guys this, man, but I mean, not that I don’t have my f—ing have my heart and trust in to the f—ing bond that we have with our f—ing surroundings and what we’ve done. But I mean, there’s a lot of f—ing numbers leading up to that, if that makes sense.
Red: Okay. That’s been off my radar for a year and a half, man. It’s water on the bridge. It doesn’t make a f— to me. So no, that has nothing to do with this, if that’s what you’re asking in a roundabout way.
Bryon Brockway: Yeah, I am.
Red: Okay. No, there’s zero connection. This is just another job that landed in my lap that I’m trying to get done. It’s not. . .
Bryon Brockway: All right. Cool, man. And honestly, it’s never this f—ing super difficult, dude. It’s just that one thing that everything f—ing lined up in a row. It’s like, oh man, it sounds like it’s straight out of a f—ing book. Yeah.
Red: Right.
Bryon Brockway: So that’s why we’re f—ing like cats and socks, man.
Red: Okay. What do you mean, lined up in a book? I’m not following.
Bryon Brockway: No, it sounds like it’s straight out of a book, like a textbook that someone would study to f—ing honeypot us.
Bryon was right. By December 2021, just one month after that last call, Bryon Brockway, Adam Carey, Gil Peled, and Erik Maund had all been arrested.
That was the first of our three bonus episodes. We’ll be back next week with a look at the real-world business of hit men, and how that squares with the way they’re portrayed in Hollywood and video games . . . and podcasts.
Thanks for listening, and for being a Texas Monthly audio subscriber.
