Cult Leader Kills "Gay" Boy, 4

Peter Lucas Moses, a cult leader from North Carolina, faces the death penalty for killing a 4-year-old boy he thought to be gay, as well as a 28-year-old woman who was barren and wanted to leave the group. Moses presided over a house in which four women and nine children lived. He was the father of all the children but the one he murdered.

According to testimony, Moses told 25-year-old Vania Rae Sisk to get rid of her 4-year-old son Jadon Higganbothan because he might be gay. Moses is said to have believed this because the boy's father left Sisk. After learning that Jadon had hit another of the children on the bottom, Moses told the women to setup computer equipment and speakers. While religious music played, he took the boy into the garage and shot him.

In December, Peter Lucas Moses and the other women beat Antoinetta Yvonne McKoy throughout the day before he shot and killed her. Sisk is said to have brought him the gun. McKoy managed to get free and run to a neighbor's house, but the neighbor refused to call police for reasons undisclosed or unknown. Though McKoy begged for her life, the women were afraid Moses would go back to jail and insisted he kill her. The cult then taped the body into plastic bags and placed it in a dumpster - but not before displaying it to friends and family.

All of the surviving cult members face first-degree murder charges in North Carolina.

© C Harris Lynn, 2011