Cult leader admits to killing 4-year-old boy

A man who led a polygamous cult pleaded guilty Monday to murder charges after killing a 4‑year‑old boy he believed was gay. Because of the deal, Peter Moses, head of the Black Hebrews cult in Durham, N.C., will not face the death penalty for the 2010 shootings of Yvonne McKoy, 28, and Jadon Higganbothan.

What Led to Peter Moses’ Conviction?

Prosecutors said Moses assumed the child might be gay because his father had left his mother. He believed the father was gay and told the mother, Vania Rae Sisk, to “get rid” of the child.

They said Larhonda Renee Smith, 40, told Moses that Jadon had hit another child’s bottom. After hearing this, Moses became angry and walked around the house with a gun. Later, she repeated that Jadon had hit another child’s bottom.

He took the screaming child into the garage and shot him in the head with his mother’s gun while The Lord’s Prayer played loudly in the background.

“He starts screaming, ‘I told you to get rid of him!’ and told Sisk, ‘How am I going to do this?’” District Attorney Tracy Cline recalled from the witness’ account.

Prosecutors said Moses ordered two women to set up computers and speakers in the garage. They said he played music with The Lord’s Prayer in Hebrew, took Jadon inside and shut the door. Moments later, the women heard a gunshot.

Witnesses’ Account

Prosecutors said the witness told them the women helped clean up Jadon’s body and placed it in a suitcase in Moses’ master suite. Moses later told them to remove it because it was beginning to smell.

Moses also killed Antoinetta Yvonne McKoy, 28, after learning she could not have children and wanted to leave the group.

According to NY Daily News,
After she left the compound to call her mother, she was dragged back by Moses’ other “wives,” beaten and nearly strangled with an electrical cord.

A witness told authorities that the women, led by Jadon’s mother, insisted McKoy had to be killed. They took her into a bathroom, turned on the same music and shot her.

Moses showed off her body at a party before he tossed the remains in a trash bin.

Another woman escaped the cult and told police two people had been killed in the home, bringing the horrors to light.

A plumber discovered the bodies in the backyard of the house where Moses’ mother had lived.

Prosecutors said they had planned to seek the death penalty. Moses will instead serve two consecutive life sentences without parole because he agreed to testify against six co‑defendants.