Christian Musicians Killed Over a Crown Vic

June 20, 2008— -- Two men have been charged with capital murder for allegedly gunning down a pair of Christian musicians outside a Texas recording studio and taking off in one of the victim's cars.

Demarious Dwight Cummings and James Broadnax, both 19, of Texarkana, were arrested late Thursday night about 170 miles from the spot where Matthew Butler, 28, and Steve Swan, 26, were found dead early that morning. Each suspect faces capital murder charges and will be held on $1 million bond.

A third suspect, 18-year-old Lonnie Harris, was also arrested and originally charged in the murders, but was released by police late this afternoon. "We don't believe that he had anything to do with it," Lt. Joe Harn, a spokesman for the Garland Police Department, confirmed to ABC News.

Texas authorities allege the motive for the murders was the theft of a 1995 Ford Crown Victoria that belonged to one of the murder victims and ultimately tied the trio to the crime.

Police in Texarkana arrested the three teenagers shortly before 8 p.m. CT after a traffic stop in a rough section of town. A search of the license plates on the tan-colored Crown Victoria had come back as belonging to a Cadillac.

A patrolman saw the same vehicle parked near the scene of a police officer assault an hour earlier, Sgt. Shawn Fitzgerald, a spokesman for the Texarkana Police Department, told ABC News.

A local warrant check found that all three Texarkana residents had outstanding warrants and the three were taken into custody. Fitzgerald said that the suspects have all had brushes with Texarkana police in the past on lesser charges, including burglary, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.

Texarkana police then ran the true vehicle registration number and immediately learned that the Crown Victoria was potentially involved in a double homicide that occurred early Thursday morning 170 miles away in Garland, Texas.

"We got a hit back from the Garland Police Department saying that that vehicle might have been used in the double murder," Fitzgerald said.

A passing bicyclist found Butler and Swan around 1:20 a.m. Thursday. Both had been shot several times on the sidewalk in front of the Zion Gate recording studio, a music business specializing in contemporary Christian music that Butler opened in 2005 and where his friend Swan worked as an engineer. Both were dead at the scene, according to the Garland Police Department.