Blanche Taylor Moore
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| Blanche Taylor Moore | |
|---|---|
| Birth name: | Blanche Kiser Taylor Moore |
| Born: | February 17, 1933 Burlington, North Carolina  |
| Penalty: | Death |
| Killings | |
| Number of victims: | 4 |
| Span of killings: | 1968 through 1989 |
| Country: | U.S. |
| State(s): | North Carolina |
| Date apprehended: | July 18, 1989 |
Blanche Taylor Moore (born 1933) is a convicted murderer and probable serial killer from Alamance County, North Carolina. Her modus operandi included poisoning by arsenic hidden in food.
Contents |
[edit] Biography
[edit] Early life
She was born Blanche Kiser to an alcoholic father, who later forced her into prostitution to pay family bills. In 1952, she married James N. Taylor; she bore him two children, one in 1953 and another in 1959.
[edit] Personal problems
In 1962, she began an affair with Raymond Reid, an assistant manager at a local Kroger's grocery store. After her husband's death in 1971, the two began dating publicly. By 1985, however, the relationship had soured. There are indications that she began to date Kevin Denton, a manager at the Kroger's Grocery where she worked, however that relationship ended, and Moore filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Denton and Kroger in 1985. Denton was forced to resign, and Kroger settled the case out of court two years later for $275,000.
In 1985, Moore also accused an unknown "pervert" of starting two fires that damaged her mobile home. On Easter Sunday, she met Rev. Dwight Moore, the new pastor of the Carolina United Church of Christ, who was divorced, and they began meeting for meals. At the time, Moore was still dating Raymond Reid.
[edit] Murders
In 1986, Reid developed what was initially diagnosed as a case of shingles. He was hospitalized in April of that year, but by October, he had developed what doctors believed was a severe case of Guillain-Barré syndrome. Reid died on October 7, 1986.
Blanche and Dwight Moore began seeing each other publicly shortly after Reid's death. They planned to marry, but in 1987, Blanche Moore developed breast cancer. The wedding date was pushed back to November 1988, but Moore developed a mysterious intestinal ailment that required two surgeries to correct. In April 1989, the couple married and honeymooned in New Jersey. Returning home on April 26, 1989, Dwight collapsed after eating a pastry. After two days of suffering, he was admitted to Alamance County Hospital on April 28. For the next two days, Moore was transferred between that hospital and North Carolina Memorial Hospital.
Finally, doctors in the CCU led by David Wohns, Jonathan Serody, and George Sanders at North Carolina Memorial Hospital ordered a toxic screen. On May 13, the results came back and showed that Dwight Moore had twenty times the lethal dose of arsenic in his system. Police were notified, and exhumations occurred on Moore's ex-husband, boyfriend, father, and mother-in-law. Subsequent autopsies showed elevated levels of arsenic in all of the bodies.
On July 18, 1989, she was arrested and charged with the first degree murder of Raymond Reid.
[edit] Trial, Conviction and Sentence
The trial opened in Winston-Salem on October 21, 1990. The state introduced 53 witnesses who testified about her daily trips to the hospital, bearing food. She was convicted on November 14. On November 17, the jury recommended the death penalty. On January 18, 1991, the presiding judge concurred with the jury and sentenced Moore to die by lethal injection. She currently resides at the North Carolina Correctional Institute for Women. She is prisoner # 0288088.
Because of the automatic appeals in progress, Moore has not yet been tried for the murders of P. D. Kiser, Isla Taylor, James N. Taylor, or any other speculated victims. She has also not yet been tried for the attempted murder of Dwight Moore. Charges remain pending in all cases.
[edit] Speculated Murders
During the investigation that led to Moore's conviction, exhumations were also performed on several other people. Subsequent examinations showed that her father, P. D. Kiser, and her first husband, James N. Taylor, had both died of arsenic poisoning. There are other speculated victims, including several close friends and relatives who died mysteriously showing some signs of arsenic poisoning, but none of them have been exhumed for further evaluation. Other possible victims include her mother-in-law Isla Taylor.
[edit] Book and Movie
In 1993, author Jim Schutze wrote a book about the murders, entitled Preacher's Girl. Later that year, Elizabeth Montgomery starred as Moore in the made-for-TV movie based on the book entitled The Black Widow Murders: The Blanche Taylor Moore Story.
[edit] Victims List
Bold indicates a victim who died.
- P. D. Kiser - (1968), exhumations showed arsenic poisoning
- Isla Taylor - (1970), exhumations showed arsenic poisoning
- James N. Taylor (1971), exhumations showed arsenic poisoning
- Raymond Reid - (1986), death by arsenic poisoning
- Dwight Moore - (1989), poisoned by arsenic, recovered
