Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of murder. Reader discretion is advised.
ABC 20/20’s Bad Romance revisited the tragic murder case of Knoxville cheerleader Emma Walker. According to ABC News, Walker’s mother found her dead of a gunshot wound to the head in her bedroom one morning in November 2016. Friends and family believed that her ex-boyfriend, Riley Gaul, could have hurt her. The victim had broken off their relationship two weeks before the murder.
Detectives eventually implicated Gaul in Walker’s murder using a gun – the murder weapon – and other evidence. They recovered the weapon after two of Gaul’s friends participated in a sting operation and helped authorities catch the suspect while he attempted to dispose of the gun. According to The U.S. Sun, sources close to Gaul alleged that the college football player didn’t take his breakup with Walker well.
Gaul faced multiple charges, including first-degree murder, which resulted in a conviction in May 2018. He received a life sentence with the possibility of parole after 51 years, reported ESPN.
The 20/20 Bad Romance episode on ABC premiered on Monday, February 5, 2024.
How was Emma Walker’s killer, Riley Gaul, caught?
High school cheerleader from Knoxville Emma Walker had been in an on-again-off-again relationship with Riley Gaul for two years. Walker’s friends described Gaul, who played football at Tennessee’s Maryville College, as obsessive and controlling. ABC reported that even after Walker broke it off with him, he continued to contact her repeatedly.
The outlet reported that Walker was receiving anonymous texts about Gaul being kidnapped. Moreover, less than 48 hours before her death, a mysterious man dressed in black from head to toe had been stalking her. Then, on the morning of November 21, 2016, the cheerleader’s mother found her unresponsive in her room. She died of a single gunshot wound to the head.
Riley Gaul’s friend Alex McCarty told detectives that the weekend of Emma Walker’s death, he told them a secret. McCarty said, “He [Gaul] ended up telling me that he was so fearful for his life that he had stolen his grandfather’s gun, and he showed it to me. I held it in my hand that night.” He further said that Gaul assured them “he was just so scared of these people who were out to get him, were out to get Emma.”
After authorities confronted Gaul with the firearm, he denied ever having possessed the gun. Additionally, he lied to McCarty about the gun’s whereabouts. He also asked them not to talk to the police about the said weapon. McCarty told ABC 20/20 that Gaul was “frantic about getting caught.” Another friend, Noah Walton, said, “He was on edge.”
The two friends said that Gaul told them, “The only thing we can do is I’ll just have to get rid of it.” Gaul further said that he wanted to get rid of the weapon to avoid taking the blame for something he did not do. He also told them that he did not want to go to jail. That’s when they began suspecting Gaul’s involvement in Emma Walker’s murder.
Meanwhile, investigators learned that the killer had shot 16-year-old Walker with a 9 mm handgun. It was the same caliber as the gun that Riley Gaul’s grandfather had reported missing. Alex McCarty and Noah Walton then began plotting a sting operation with detectives to help them catch Gaul.
Just one day after Walker’s murder, police wired McCarty and Walton to put their plan into action. The duo invited Gaul to play video games. He initially began coaching McCarty and Walton to lie to the police about being under the influence. Gaul asked them to tell the police, “Whatever statement you [gave] them wasn’t a straightforward answer.”
ABC reported that Gaul then suggested that they go to the Bluffs, a wooded area by the Tennessee River, to get rid of the gun by throwing it in the water. On the way, they stopped at Gaul’s stepfather’s house, where he claimed he had hidden the weapon and came out with a trash bag.
The police, who had been tailing the boys, intercepted them after receiving communications from McCarty and Walton. They arrested 18-year-old Gaul and charged him with first-degree murder and six other felony charges. These included theft of a firearm and aggravated stalking. Detectives also found gloves, trash bags, tennis shoes, black tape, and black clothing inside the trash bag. They believed it was the same black clothing he used as the mysterious man dressed in all black as well as during the murder.
In May 2018, a jury convicted Riley Gaul of Emma Walker’s first-degree murder. Other charges included stalking, theft, reckless endangerment, and being in possession of a firearm during a dangerous felony. He received a life sentence with the possibility of parole after 51 years, reported ESPN.
The 20/20 Bad Romance episode on Emma Walker’s murder case premiered on Monday, February 5, 2024.
