The case gained national attention in the United States due to speculation that the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang was responsible, but this was later found to be untrue.
Eric Lyle Williams (born April 7, 1967),[1] a former lawyer and justice of the peace whose theft case was prosecuted by two of the victims, was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to death for two of the murders.
[4] On January 31, 2013, Mark Hasse was shot and killed while walking in the 100 block of East Grove Street in Kaufman, Texas.
Most hypotheses involved allegations that the Aryan Brotherhood, a Neo-Nazi prison gang, had been responsible for the murder; they were later found to be untrue.
[14] Mike McLelland was an officer in the U.S. Army Reserve for 23 years, and worked as a clinical psychologist before pursuing a legal career.
Eric Williams, a former attorney and justice of the peace for Kaufman County, had been convicted of burglary and theft while in office and was the only person prosecuted by both McLelland and Hasse.
[22] As of October 2021[update], Eric Lyle Williams is incarcerated in the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ)[23][24] and is awaiting execution.
[26] Kim Williams, after testifying against Eric in his trial, pled guilty to her role in planning and performing the murders, on December 30, 2014, and was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
[27] In March 2018, HarperCollins published a book on the cases written by veteran journalist Kathryn Casey, In Plain Sight: The Kaufman County Prosecutor Murders.