Michael John Moore Sr. will remain in prison for the rest of his life for tying and handcuffing his wife to their bed in their Fayetteville home, suffocating her with plastic trash bags tied to her head, then taking a trip to Las Vegas and pawning her jewelry, the North Carolina Court of Appeals said in a ruling issued Tuesday.
However, the appeals court overturned an additional sentence of five to seven years for kidnapping. It said Michael Moore’s restraint of his wife, Marcquius “Wendy” Clarrissa Timmons-Moore, was an inherent part of the murder, vs. a separate crime, so it is unconstitutional to punish him as though it were a separate criminal act.
Moore is also serving an additional sentence of one to two years for stealing Wendy’s jewelry and car after he killed her.
Michael Moore, 49, killed Wendy Timmons-Moore, in August 2018, according to evidence and testimony presented at his trial in August 2022. The jury that convicted Michael Moore could have voted to sentence him to death; it instead opted for a life sentence without parole.
When the police found Wendy Timmons-Moore’s body, they saw written in red crayon above her head, “Here lies the ultimate of all strumpets,” court documents say.
“Strumpet” is an old term for a prostitute. It may be best known nowadays from performances of Othello by William Shakespeare, where the character Othello calls his wife, Desdemona, a strumpet after he was tricked by the villain Iago into thinking she cheated on him. Toward the end of the play, Othello smothers Desdemona, then a few minutes later he stabs himself and dies next to her body on their bed after he realizes he was wrong.
According to testimony in Michael Moore’s case, earlier in the couple’s relationship, he had acted “jealous” and at least once called Wendy a “harlot.”
After Michael Moore smothered Wendy in his and Wendy’s bed, he didn’t stab himself. Instead, he took Wendy’s jewelry and her car and went to Vegas, court documents say.
Records from the trial say the two started dating in 2016, began living together in Baltimore, Maryland, and eloped to Las Vegas and moved to a home in Fayetteville in 2017.
In August 2018, police broke into the house and found Wendy’s body after Wendy’s family members sought help because they were unable to contact her over the course of a week — Wendy was overdue to pick up her daughter from her sister’s house.
Michael Moore, meanwhile, was in Las Vegas with Wendy’s car, which the Las Vegas police found the day after Fayetteville police found her body.
Court documents say Michael Moore surrendered to Las Vegas police in early September 2018 after he ran out of money.
Tuesday’s decision to overturn the kidnapping charge (which was levied because Michael Moore had tied Wendy to the bed), was a 2-1 vote of a three-judge panel. Chief Judge Chris Dillon and Judge Fred Gore voted to overturn; Judge Carolyn Thompson dissented.
“I would conclude that the evidence of the additional restraints of the victim — the zip ties and electrical cords wrapped around her ankles, and electrical cord around her neck — restraints separate and apart from the handcuffs on her hands and the bag over her head — which, again, were the restraints necessary to commit murder by asphyxiation in the present case — were sufficient to overcome defendant’s motion to dismiss due to insufficiency of the evidence,” Thompson wrote. “I would affirm defendant’s first-degree kidnapping conviction, and respectfully dissent.”
The Court of Appeals ruling may be reviewed by the N.C. Supreme Court.
Senior reporter Paul Woolverton can be reached at 910-261-4710 and pwoolverton@cityviewnc.com.
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