carrollton, home to those piney woods. billy was the ringleader of a colorful crew, many of them petty criminals related to billy by blood or marriage. it s certainly a strange cast of characters. but they re east texas folks. some people might depict them as the heehaw gang. a gang that was just getting by in a region struggling to make it. there s a lot of drugs, a lot of methamphetamine out there. if somebody makes money out there, has extra money, they just hand it out to each other. at his meeting with investigators billie earl was a man on a mission. he wanted to cut a deal and fast. i m 49 years old. i don t get out till 15 years. i have grandkids i want to spend the rest of my life with. i want to be free. i want out this weekend. billie told the cops he knew things about the shooting that they did not, including the identity of the hit team. he played hardball. even as he mixed his metaphors.
billie and his family were willing to talk about killing nancy. and every time the hit didn t happen, john wanted to know why. billie was the master of outlandish excuses. he had a brain tumor. he had seizures. he had spells. he d done too much dope. the neighbors were home. he [ bleep ] him just as far as he could take it. and john would buy it hook, line and sinker every time. reporter: mr. john s big money scheme to kill nancy howard was an economic bonanza for east texas. according to charlie, billie earl couldn t seem to spend that money fast enough. motorcycles, vehicles for his children, all three of them, a car for his mother, three or four four-wheelers, a couple go-karts for the grandkids, a ski boat. he bought me a riding mower, a four-wheeler, numerous assault weapons. just anything he wanted. reporter: and so for more
photo of her, details about her schedule and even suggested nancy be killed while scrapbooking with friends. she didn t do nothing wrong. she s a christian woman, dude. that s it. you know? who shared with you that she s a christian woman? john did. reporter: dustin told the detectives john liked to spread his money around. he started laying out the whole thing regarding his step-dad, billie johnson, his mom, meetings with john, large sums of money being transferred. he was talking right in the millions. sounds hard to believe. yeah. so he lays out including his grandmother receiving money. billie s other children that were involved. reporter: soon dustin says members of the johnson clan were calling john whenever they needed money. when they re in jail and can t get bonded out, then he decides, short story, that he decides, well, i can do this and start getting all this money.
i got the big ace in the hole and i got the ball in my court on this. if y all want this murder, this attempted murder solved y all need to work with me because i ain t [ bleep ] playing. y all want it i ll give it to you. but if the cops didn t want to play then billie earl was going to zip it. i m not giving up nothing until i ve got something solid on my end. i ll die with it. he thought he was in control. because he was sitting on an important piece of information. oh, yeah. and so i, you know, i told him, i can t go to the d.a. with you just saying this. you got to provide some information. reporter: so billie did. he was in jail on drug charges the night nancy was shot. but he told investigators he not only knew who ordered the hit on nancy, he knew how it went down. there was two of them that done it. one driving to pick him up and one that pulled the trigger. now which one drove and which one pulled the trigger, i don t know. but i know both of them. reporter:
john tried to get him to shoot nancy howard. this [ bleep ] man, he tried to get me to kill that woman. did he really? because he do you want the truth? yeah, i want the truth. you got that recorder on? yeah. i ve got to have the truth. yeah, you re [ bleep ] right that son of a bitch tried to get me to kill that woman. reporter: now out of jail, charlie told us that sometimes john transferred money between bank accounts and sometimes john met charlie and billie and handed over packages of cash at a hamburger joint or gas station, and john was always pressing them to get the hit done. i mean, he was, hey, do you think you can get it done now? what s the chances? where are you all at? billie would tell him, you know, we re about an hour away. we ll call you when we get close. okay. well, call me when you got confirmation. i want this thing done. and i was like, damn, what did this lady do? reporter: as long as john was willing to pay, charlie says