That story reminds me a lot of the killing of Ken McElroy of the small town of Skidmore Missouri in July of 1981 that I learned about from this episode of Buzzfeed Unsolved (If you watch ANYTHING on Buzzfeed, it should be Unsolved, or Worth It, but that;s off-topic to this particular story)
Here's the vid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZktTdGHaJYBasically Ken acted like he owned the entire town. He was nicknamed "The Town Bully" and that doesn't even cover half the evil, psychotic shit this dude pulled. The video goes into great detail and there is this book they mention (which I haven't read yet, might go looking for it in the library) but basically he terrorized this town with various cases of theft, cattle mutilation, and assaults. He was also a pedophile who had multiple underage "brides" that he physically and mentally abused.
He was never convicted by a jury until he was brought to court until he was charged with attempted murder for trying to blast a dude's head off with a shotgun because he'd been a witness in a case that was still ongoing at the time of the attempt on this guy's life.
Ken gets killed in broad daylight, and everyone in town except for the corrupt police he was threatening and paying off saw exactly who did it, and when the detectives tried to ask around for the culprit, not a single witness sold out the killer who did it. The town considers this person to be a hero, and honestly for a pretty solid reason.