According to the article below, Williams, Holden's murderer, was determined to "get someone" that night .. she being apparently his third and unfortunately, successful victim.
Sadly, his father is a minister and Williams reportedly lived in a trailer home next to his parents and the church. His mother was on local news last night and said that two families have been destroyed. Family and friends say that Williams has not been "the same" since he returned from Iraq and that he did not talk much of his experience there but said he had "seen a lot."
Seems, from below article, that he may be implacted in other crimes as well.
from www.tylerpaper.com
STRANGER ABDUCTIONS A RARITY
IN EAST TEXAS AUTHORITIES SAY
By JACQUE HILBURN, Staff Writer January 22, 2005
Stranger abductions are so rare in East Texas that it's been almost 20 years since one was reported in the region, an FBI official said Friday.
"There have been very few in East Texas, very few," said Jeff Millslagle, FBI supervisor and senior resident agent for the Tyler District. "It happens day in and day out, but it usually doesn't happen in East Texas."
Time is one of the most critical elements in these cases, authorities said, because the passage of time drastically increases the likelihood of death.
Stranger cases are also difficult because authorities must first familiarize themselves with the victim's habits and lifestyle, and eliminate possible suspects.
Then comes the process of tracking down the unknown.
From the moment Tyler police were notified early Thursday that Megan Leann Holden, 19, had failed to return home from work, it seemed time was against them.
She was last seen around 11:45 p.m. Wednesday, leaving the Wal-Mart Supercenter at Texas Highway 64 West and Loop 323.
About four hours passed before anyone realized the victim had actually been abducted - allegedly by ex-Marine Johnny Lee Williams Jr., 24, of Tyler - and later found shot to death, authorities said.
Her body was discovered early Friday, shortly after an Arizona police officer spotted Williams at a hospital seeking treatment for his own gunshot wound.
"That was the big break in the case," Millslagle said. "Now we're backtracking."
SHOPPERS STALKED
Tyler Police Chief Gary Swindle described the chaotic twist of events as both tragic and strange because of the rarity of the offense and the fact that a videotape captured the suspect's very public method of operation.
The suspect spent hours at the store, allegedly sizing up potential victims, authorities said.
"He was determined to grab someone that night," Swindle said. "He stood out there waiting for 2½ hours, waiting. Bless her heart, he sees her ... there was no one else around.
"There is no doubt this was a total stranger abduction," Swindle said. "We do think he potentially did make other attempts before he got Megan."
Ms. Holden was apparently his third attempt, the chief said, citing Wal-Mart surveillance footage that shows him following two other women into the darkened parking lot before changing his mind.
Grainy footage shot inside and outside the store shows a duffel-bag-toting Williams lurking near a restroom and an exterior concrete pillar, peering at passers-by.
At one point, he strolls past several cars, glancing off-screen before turning and returning to the store. He is questioned briefly by a security guard, but is allowed to remain at the store, the video shows.
In the final segments, the victim is observed walking to her Ford F-150 truck as a figure in the distance breaks into a run. Upon reaching the young woman, the figure shoves her and she crumples to the pavement.
The suspect loads her into the vehicle and, moments later, roars out of the parking lot.
Swindle said that was the first, last and only glimpse of the suspect, who remained unknown until early Friday, when he showed up at an Arizona hospital.
"We had a composite (from witness accounts) of him, but we did not have his name," Swindle said.
Authorities said they are confident Williams is the man on the video, citing an abundance of evidence - including the duffel bag - located within the vehicle.
But Swindle did acknowledge that Williams, whose record shows previous arrests for drug use and theft, was a key suspect in at least two robberies and potentially other types of violent crimes.
"We think there were other victims," he said Friday. "Right now we are digging into his life as it was since his release from the military. We're wanting to know why this happened - obviously, there was a crime spree. We're running a search warrant at his home right now."
Authorities do not believe Williams is the same man who crawled through the living room of a home on Bain Place two weeks ago and grabbed an elderly woman as she sat watching a late-night movie.
There are few developments in that incident, which ended without injury after the suspect dragged the woman outside and she began screaming for help.
In another supposed abduction case reported last week, Dallas police called off their search Friday for a missing Southern Methodist University student last seen in the college parking lot eight days ago.
Alexander Weckiewicz, 19, was found unharmed in a Dallas library. He had been living in the public facility and a homeless shelter since his disappearance, authorities said.
1986 ABDUCTION DEATH
Federal authorities, who have been investigating Thursday's kidnapping in conjunction with Tyler police and more than half a dozen agencies, said the last known East Texas stranger abduction case also ended with arrest.
"The last case happened in 1986," Millslagle said.
The suspect in that case, Jerry Walter "Animal" McFadden, was executed in 1999 for the strangulation-beating death of Suzanne Denise Harrison, 18.
Miss Harrison, a Hawkins High School senior, and two friends were last seen May 4, 1986, at Lake Hawkins in Wood County. The body of Miss Harrison, who had been sexually assaulted, was found the next day at a mountaintop roadside park near Gilmer in Upshur County.
Five days after Miss Harrison was found, the bodies of her friends, Bryan Boone, 19, and Gena Lee Turner, 20, were discovered in a ditch beside Farm-to-Market Road 1649 near Ore City.
The pair, both from Hawkins, had been shot, records show.
McFadden was never charged in Boone's and Miss Turner's deaths.
His case drew national media attention when his July 9, 1986, escape and abduction of a female jailer from the Upshur County Jail in Gilmer triggered one of the largest manhunts in Texas history.
The search involved an estimated 1,000 officers from more than 30 different law enforcement agencies.
The jailer escaped unharmed the day after the jailbreak from a railroad boxcar where McFadden had held her in Big Sandy. The next day, McFadden was peacefully recaptured at a vacant house nearby.
The case of McFadden, who had several convictions for sex-related offenses and had been paroled from prison prior to the 1986 slayings, triggered a grass-roots citizens' movement aimed at toughening punishment of criminals.
Jacque Hilburn covers Tyler city government, planning and zoning and the Parks Board. She can be reached at 903.596.6282. e-mail: news@tylerpaper.com
Thx for the story. One problem I have is that cameras in a parking lot do no good if they are not monitored. We are reading a post-mortem analysis of what happened. That poor victim may still be alive had Walmart security notified the police at the time of the abduction.
I was born and raised in East Texas. There are some really strange folks there.