Car dealer charged in $750,000 murder-for-hire plot that killed TN couple, feds say
A car dealer and three other men were charged in a murder-for-hire plot more than two years after a Tennessee couple was shot to death and dumped at a Nashville construction site, federal prosecutors say.
The car dealer, Erik Charles Maund, 47, of Austin, Texas, is accused of paying more than $750,000 to three men for taking part in the murder of the woman, who he previously had a relationship with, and her boyfriend, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee.
In addition to Maund, Gilad Peled, 48, and Bryon Brockway, 47, also from Austin, and Adam Carey, 31, of Richlands, North Carolina, were charged with murder for hire, conspiracy to kidnap resulting in death, and kidnapping resulting in death in a superseding indictment, a July 28 news release says. Brockway and Carey were former active-duty marines and Peled was a former Israeli Defense Forces member, court documents show.
McClatchy News contacted attorneys listed for the men on July 29. An attorney for Maund declined to comment.
Before the Nashville couple was shot to death in March 2020, Maund, a married man, was a partner in Maund Automotive Group in Austin, an indictment states. This company had Toyota and Volkswagen dealerships and was founded by Maund’s father.
In February 2020, Maund messaged the Nashville woman that he would be in the area and told her he would “love to see (her) again,” according to court documents. Then, he allegedly arranged to meet her at a Nashville hotel where he would stay.
Their communications led to the woman’s boyfriend texting Maund with demands for money or he would expose their relationship, prosecutors say.
The murder-for-hire plot
To deal with the man’s “extortionate demands,” Maund is accused of hiring Brockway, Carey and Peled who, at the time, owned a security services business that was involved in responding to extortion attempts, an indictment shows.
Then, the Nashville couple was unknowingly put under surveillance by Carey and others who traveled to Tennessee to keep tabs on them and used a Pinger account to try to communicate with them, the news release says.
On March 9, 2020, two days before the murders, Peled received a document showing the woman’s apartment complex address and car, as well as information confirming the man stayed at her home, prosecutors say.
The document also “advised that Carey and others would use everything at their disposal to stop the attempted extortion of Maund,” according to the release.
The murders
On March 11, 2020, prosecutors say Brockway and Carey, armed with guns, arrived at the woman’s apartment complex and confronted the couple before shooting the man to death in the parking lot.
Brockway and Carey are accused of then kidnapping the woman and loading the man’s body into a car before driving to a construction site in Nashville, according to the release.
At the site, the woman was fatally shot several times and her body, as well as the man’s, was “discarded” there, according to prosecutors.
“Within hours of the murders, the Pinger account used to communicate was deleted and a rental car rented by Brockway was returned,” the release says.
That same day, Maund transferred more than $750,000 to a bank account that Peled controlled to pay the three men for the “kidnapping and murder” of the couple, prosecutors say.
All four men were arrested in December 2021 and have stayed in law enforcement custody since, according to the release.
While in custody, Maund was accused of trying to have a co-conspirator killed after they wanted more money for taking part in the alleged crimes, prosecutors say.
“Maund agreed to pay the co-conspirator an additional $25,000 and then offered Peled $50,000 to arrange to pay Brockway $100,000 for the murder of the co-conspirator, to cut off any future requests for payment for the original murders,” the release says.
If the four men are convicted on the charges they face, they could be sentenced to up to life in prison, according to the attorney’s office.
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