Three days after 24-year-old Alyssa Burkett was shot to death outside her office in Carrollton, Texas, Andrew Beard – with whom Burkett had a one-year-old daughter – was charged with her murder. The next day, Beard's fiancee holly elkins Voluntarily sat down with two detectives at the Carrollton Police Department.
“I wanted to use him as a witness in this. And if he had information that could put him in the witness column and not the suspect column, I would listen to him,” said Det. Jeremy Chevalier told correspondent Peter Van Sant. “A plot to eliminate Alyssa Burkett,” The all-new “48 Hours” airs Saturday, November 16 at 10/9c on CBS and streams on Paramount+.
Lizette Bowers/Stephen Green
Elkins told Chevalier and Sgt. Michael Harding was convinced he had the wrong man. “I can't believe my fiancé would do something like that to a woman or anyone…” she said.
And Elkins also said she was willing to help if she could: “I feel bad not helping something that I think is so tragic… I feel morally I feel conflicted because I want to help, but I don't have anything…”
But there was one thing Elkins was adamant on – Beard was at home with her the morning Burkett was murdered. “…If I have any reasonable cause to believe that Andrew left that house and did this, I will turn it over to you. I will do that, I promise,” Elkins told detectives.
“At first it seemed like an open-and-shut case,” Chevalier told “48 Hours.” He later learned that “Andrew Beard was only half the story.”
On the morning of October 2, 2020, Burkett parked outside the Greentree Apartment Leasing office when a man in a black Ford Expedition pulled up next to her. He got out of his SUV and shot Burkett through the driver's side window.
Believing she was dead, the attacker began to drive away, but Burkett was still alive. As she got out of her car and ran toward her office, the attacker – described by multiple witnesses as a black man – got out of his car and pursued Burkett with a hunting knife. He stabbed and slashed her 44 times before running away forever. When Burkett's mother, Teresa Collard, arrived at the scene, she immediately gave investigators a name: Andrew Beard.
alyssa burkett
In the months before his death, Burkett and Beard, who was 33 at the time, were involved in a bitter custody battle over their daughter, Willow. Following Willow's birth in July 2019, Beard filed for primary custody of the child. “Andrew, he made more money than [Alyssa] … She was afraid that … he wanted Willow, and he was going to get her,'' Madison Grimes, Burkett's younger sister, told Van Sant.
Ultimately, in the spring of 2020, things seemed to calm down between Burkett and Beard after meeting with Willow and coming to an agreement on child support. Beard also began dating Holly Elkins and Burkett's family said she was happy that Beard had found someone new.
But the peace between Beard and Burkett was shattered when she again began demanding primary custody of Willow. Burkett also could not shake the uneasy feeling that she was being watched, and told her family that Beard always knew where she was. “Every day you feel like you have to be watching over your shoulder… I thought that was how she lived,” Collard told “48 Hours.”
Within hours of Burkett's murder, police pulled over Beard in his F-150 pickup truck, with Elkins and Willows inside. Police confiscated his truck and told Beard and Elkins they could leave, but they could not return home. Later that night, police searched Beard's home and found GPS tracker batteries and charging stations that matched the tracking device detectives discovered under Burkett's car earlier that day.
The next day, police searched Beard's F-150 pickup and recovered two bottles of dark foundation – the makeup investigators believed Beard had used to disguise himself as a black man on the morning of the murder. Later that night, police found the black Ford SUV the attacker had driven to the scene. It was found abandoned less than a mile from Beard's home.
On October 5, 2020, Beard surrendered to the Carrollton Police Department and was charged with murder. He spent two weeks behind bars before being released on bond. Chevalier said he was concerned about Baby Willow's safety, so he contacted the federal government to pursue the case under federal gun laws.
Because an unregistered silencer was found during a search of Beard's home, the federal government agreed to take the case. Eight days after getting out on bond, Beard was arrested again and ultimately charged with cyberstalking using a dangerous weapon, resulting in death.
In June 2022, Beard pleaded guilty. A month later, he spoke to the FBI as part of a plea agreement, and he had a lot to say – especially when it came to Elkins' role in the plot to kill Burkett. Beard told the FBI, “…it was… 'You're going to do it this way,' it was, '…you're going to wear this dark makeup…' That was her plan.. .This is how it will be done.”
Investigators soon realized that Holly Elkins had told detectives, “I want to help, I really do. But I don't have any answers…” Just four days after Burkett's murder, she Gave the performance of life. “She was the one running the show… She was the one telling him what he was going to do…” Chevalier told “48 Hours.”
Investigators dug into text messages between Elkins and Beard, which revealed Elkins' true feelings about Burkett. “She hated Alissa to death,” Harding told Van Sant.
A week before the murder, Elkins had messaged Beard while she was on a trip to Mexico and wrote, “I hope you can handle this, I'm not coming home to fuck.” Beard responded, “That's my goal.”
During his interview, Beard explained to investigators: “I basically said, 'Okay' and submitted to whatever she wanted me to do, which is what I did.”
After talking to Beard, the FBI spent nearly a year building a solid case against Elkins. And in the eyes of investigators, Elkins was just as guilty as Beard for Burkett's death. “I 100% believe that if Holly and Andrew had never met, Alyssa Burkett would be alive today,” Harding told “48 Hours.”
In May 2023, Beard was sentenced to 43 years in federal prison. Investigators believed that Elkins thought the case was closed. “I think she believed that the more she got away from it, the less involved she would be in it,” Chevalier said. “But it didn't work out for him.”
Two months after Beard was sentenced, Elkins was arrested by federal agents at Miami Airport after returning from a trip to the Dominican Republic. He was charged with stalking using a dangerous weapon and conspiracy to commit stalking resulting in death. Elkins pleaded not guilty.
In April 2024, Elkins went on trial as a co-conspirator, where one of the federal prosecutors put it this way: “Andrew Beard was a monster, but he was Holly Elkins' monster,” Harding told “48 Hours.” told. After a week's trial the case went to the jury. Jurors deliberated for about 90 minutes and returned a verdict of guilty on all counts. Three months later, he was sentenced to two life terms – much longer than Beard's sentence.