Crime & Justice

Cult leader admits to killing 4-year-old boy

A man head of a polygamous cult pleaded guilty on Monday on charges of murder after killing a 4-year-old boy he thought was gay.

Published

12 years ago

June 12, 2012

Unheard Voices Staff

Man Head of Cult Admits Killing 4-Year-old Boy Because He Thought He Was Gay

A man who’s head of a polygamous cult pleaded guilty on Monday on charges of murder after killing a 4-year-old boy he thought was gay.

Because of the deal, Peter Moses, who led a small cult called the Black Hebrews in Durham, N.C., won’t face the death penalty for the 2010 shootings of Yvonne McKoy, 28, and Jadon Higganbothan.

According to prosecutors, Moses assumed that the child might be gay because his father had left his mother.

He thought the child’s father was gay. He told the mother, Vania Rae Sisk, to “get rid” of the child.

Prosecutors said that Larhonda Renee Smith, 40, told Moses that Jadon had hit another child’s bottom.

After hearing this, Moses became angry and started walking around the house with a gun. Later, she told him that he 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 the witness’ account.

Moses ordered two of the women to set up computers and speakers in the garage, prosecutors said they were told by the witness.

They said he started playing music with the Lord’s Prayer in Hebrew, took Jadon in the garage and shut the door, and the women then heard a gunshot.

Prosecutors said the witness told them that the women helped clean up the body of Jadon, who had been shot in the head, and put it in a suitcase in Moses’ master suite. He later told them to get the body out because it was beginning to smell, prosecutors said.

Moses also killed Antoinetta Yvonne McKoy, 28, after he learned that she couldn’t 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,” mercilessly beaten and nearly strangled with an electrical cord.

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

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

The horrors came to light when another woman escaped the cult and told police two people had been killed in the home.

The bodies were discovered by a plumber in the backyard of house where Moses’ mother had lived.

Prosecutors said they had intended to seek the death penalty for Moses, but he will instead face two consecutive life sentences without possibility of parole because he has agreed to testify against the six co-defendants in the case.

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Crime & Justice

Arrests made for fatal shooting at Delaware State University

Camay Mitchell De Silva was shot and killed on April 21 while visiting her best friend at Delaware State University.

Published

2 days ago

May 13, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Camay Mitchell De Silva (Photo Source: GoFundMe)

Authorities have announced arrests have been made for the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Camay Mitchell De Silva last month at Delaware State University.

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Arrests made in Delaware State shooting of Camay Mitchell De Silva

De Silva was shot and killed by a stray bullet on April 21 while visiting her best friend who attended Delaware State University.

Police announced in a press release that 20-year-old Destry Jones and 18-year-old Damien Hinson, both from Dover, are being charged with the murder of Camay Mitchell De Silva.

The pair are also charged with the attempted murder of two other young men in connection with the April 21 shooting.

Jones was arrested in Brooklyn, New York and Hinson was arrested later that day in Dover, police said.

According to authorities, neither of the suspects in this case are enrolled at or affiliated with Delaware State University.

Police claimed Jones and Hinson were involved in a fight with two other men before shots were fired. Investigators do not believe De Silva was the intended target or involved in the altercation.

Beloved taken too soon

De Silva was a 2023 graduate of Concord High School who graduated with a 3.0. She spent her first semester of college at Morgan State University in Baltimore but decided she wanted to come home to Delaware.

She then attended Delaware Technical Community College and planned to attend DSU in the fall to pursue a degree in Computer Science, with the goal of working in cybersecurity.

Crime & Justice

Paramedic involved in Elijah McClain’s death sentenced to probation, work release and community service

Jeremy Cooper, a former paramedic who injected Elijah McClain with a fatal dose of ketamine, has been sentenced to probation and community service.

Published

2 weeks ago

April 28, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Elijah McClain's family to receive $15 million from the city of Aurora

Elijah McClain and Jeremy Cooper (CBS News)

Jeremy Cooper, a former paramedic who injected Elijah McClain with a fatal dose of ketamine, has been sentenced to probation and community service.

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Paramedic Jeremy Cooper sentenced

He had faced up to three years in prison but was sentenced to four years probation, 14 months of work release and 100 hours of community service.

Cooper and another paramedic, Peter Cichuniec, were found guilty of criminally negligent homicide in December in the death of McClain, 23, who was subdued by police and injected with ketamine on August 24, 2019.

Both paramedics had pleaded not guilty to the felony charges. Cichuniec was sentenced in March to five years in prison, the minimum.

Police stop turns fatal

McClain was walking home in August 2019 when the 23-year-old Black man was confronted by police officers who forcibly restrained him. When Aurora Fire Rescue paramedics Jeremy Cooper and Peter Cichuniec arrived, they injected him with ketamine.

He went into cardiac arrest in an ambulance a few minutes later and died three days after that.

The McClain family sued the city of Aurora for Elijah’s wrongful death and received a $15 million settlement.

Crime & Justice

Honor student killed by stray bullet while visiting Delaware State University

A shooting at Delaware State University has claimed the life of 18-year-old honor student Camay Mitchell De Silva.

Published

3 weeks ago

April 26, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Camay Mitchell De Silva

Camay Mitchell De Silva, of Wilmington, Delaware, was shot and killed Sunday, on the Delaware State University campus.

The 18-year-old was visiting her best friend, a Delaware State student, when the tragic shooting occurred.

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She was an honor student

She then attended Delaware Technical Community College and planned to attend DSU in the fall to pursue a degree in Computer Science, with the goal of working in cybersecurity.

De Silva often hung out on campus with her best friend to get comfortable before attending DSU.

Delaware State shooting

The family said De Silva was visiting that friend at DSU on Saturday, April 20, and attended a party on campus that night. Around 1:40 a.m. on April 21, DSU Police received a report of shots fired on campus. The responding officers found De Silva in a residence hall suffering from a gunshot wound to her upper body. The officers administered aid and then took her to a nearby hospital where she later succumbed to her injuries.

Police say De Silva was not the intended target. Dover Police Department Chief Thomas Johnson Jr. told NBC10 there was a dispute that she was not involved in and she was hit by a stray bullet.

The suspects were seen fleeing the area and no arrests have been made, said authorities.

Dover Police released a statement from De Silva’s family requesting time to grieve and to plan for her celebration of life.