In 1991, the whole world was shocked when the police revealed a grim conspiracy involving a hitman, teenage cheerleaders, and a mother who went too far for her daughter, aka Wanda Holloway, the Pom-pom Mom, and the heights she went to secure a dream her daughter never wanted to live in the first place.
Wanda was obsessed with her daughter, Shanna. The two wore matching outfits, and it was clear that Holloway was the kind of parent who would do anything for their child. While that would have been a beautiful sentiment, it led Wanda to feed a grudge for her neighbors, Verna Heath and her daughter, Amber. She wanted Shanna to get a place on the eighth-grade cheerleading squad at Channelview High School, a position that Shanna had no interest in, but Amber desired. So, Wanda came up with a plan to get rid of the competition.
In January 1991, Wanda contacted her former brother-in-law, Terry Harper. She bluntly asked the man to kill Verna, hoping that her death would destabilize Amber and clear the way for Shanna. Her intentions are even more perverted when we remember that Amber was only 13 years old when she ordered the hit on her mother, an unthinkable action for most law-abiding citizens.
Wanda was brought to justice after Harper decided to go to the police and reveal her nefarious proposal. On January 30, 1991, Holloway was arrested for conspiring to murder, a crime that led to an intense public trial.
Did Wanda Holloway, the Pom-pom Mom, get released from prison?
After her first trial, Wanda was convicted of solicitation of capital murder and sentenced to 15 years in prison. However, one of the jurors on the trial was on probation due to a drug-related crime and should never have been put on jury duty. For that reason, Wanda’s trial was overturned. In a second trial, she decided to plea “no contest,” which meant she accepted her sentence while still not declaring herself guilty. She ended up with a sentence of 10 years in prison and a fine of $10,000. Her conviction also allowed the Heaths to pursue reparations in the civil instance, with Wanda being sentenced to pay $150,000 to the family.
Despite the gravity of her crimes, Holloway was released from prison after six months. She was on probation for the remaining 9.5 years of her sentence and had to do 1,000 hours of community service. Her most significant punishment, however, was pushing away her daughter. As Shanna revealed in 2012 on Good Morning America, her mother’s aspirations for her and her actions to achieve them, prevented them from having a daughter-mother relationship.
By choosing the worst way to support her daughter, Holloway lost what she loved the most and became a cautionary tale for Shanna, who swears to never be a “stage mom” like her mother.