- A housewife is driven by jealousy to conspire against the mother of her daughter's rival.
- In early 1990's Channelview, Texas, Wanda Holloway is determined that her thirteen year old daughter Shanna will be a cheerleader. She makes Shanna practice for hours and even hires a personal trainer. But although Shanna is good, she isn't as good as her friend Amber. Verna Heath, Amber's mother, helps run her mother's dance studio and is a former majorette. Verna and Wanda are neighbors and were once friends, but Wanda starts to hate her. Determined to win points for Shanna, she becomes a volunteer at the school and helps Shanna in her campaign for a class office. Amber is running for the same office. Despite strict rules that no candidate can hand out anything with their name on it, Wanda makes posters and glues a "Vote for Shanna" ruler to each one. Shanna is promptly disqualified and Wanda takes it very personally.
The girls will be starting junior high in the fall. Wanda feels it's either now or never; that if Shanna isn't chosen to be a cheerleader now it will never happen. Only one slot is open. Although Shanna tries hard, Amber wins. Wanda accuses Verna of cheating to make sure her daughter was chosen. Verna hasn't taken Wanda's comments seriously, but now she is exasperated and tells Wanda off.
One of Wanda's friends jokingly suggests that she have Amber killed. Wanda starts thinking about it and eventually pays a visit to her former brother-in-law, Terry Harper. Terry has a long criminal record. Wanda explains the situation and how she needs Terry's help. He is shocked when she asks him to find a hit man to kill both Verna and Amber Heath. He tells her that he is going straight now and doesn't mix with those sort of people. She persists and, playing along with her, Terry says it will cost a lot of money and no one is going to kill a kid. So Wanda settles for having Verna killed. She reasons that without Verna, Amber will lost all heart for cheerleading. To placate his angry sister-in-law, Terry promises to try and find someone.
Terry begins to feel that Wanda is setting him up to take the fall should Verna Heath be killed. With his criminal record, no one would believe he was innocent. He talks to his brother Tony, who is Shanna's father and Wanda's ex-husband. Tony agrees that Wanda is obsessed with cheerleading and suggests that Terry go to the police.
The detectives who meet with Terry are skeptical, but they agree to wire him for his next meeting with Wanda. The concern is that if Terry can't come up with the name of a hit man, Wanda might try elsewhere and succeed.
Terry lies and says he has found someone to kill Verna, but the cost will be several thousand dollars. Wanda doesn't have that kind of cash, but she offers Terry her diamond earrings as a substitute. She is in high spirits, laughing over Verna's impending demise. At last the detectives have enough evidence for a warrant.
Wanda comes home and finds the detectives waiting for her. To her shock, they arrest her and she has to spend the night in jail before her husband can bail her out. Verna is horrified when she learns that Wanda wanted her killed. Her children are frightened when they see Wanda driving past the house, imagining that she is going to kill them, and Amber has nightmares. Wanda's ex-husband takes custody of Shanna and her brother Shane.
The story goes viral and is on national news channels. Wanda is known as the "Pom Pom Mom". Shanna is reluctant to go to school, but the principal makes an announcement that neither girl is to be blamed for the mistakes their parents made. Nonetheless, Shanna has a difficult time. She didn't even really want to be a cheerleader but wanted to please her mother.
The tape of Wanda's nasty remarks about the Heaths is played in court, which doesn't help her case. She apologizes to the Heaths for "hurting their feelings" and said she hadn't meant anything by what she said. But she is still found guilty and sentenced to fifteen years for solicitation of murder. Her lawyers find a loophole; one of the jurors is on probation and therefore ineligible to serve. Because she was only sentenced to fifteen years and not more, she is eligible to remain free on bail. This upsets the Heaths, who feel they may still be in danger. Eventually Wanda serves less than a year and is released on probation.
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Top Gap
By what name was Willing to Kill: The Texas Cheerleader Story (1992) officially released in India in English?
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