A Guatemalan migrant has been sentenced to life in prison for the throat-slashing murder and robbery of a Virginia Commonwealth University graduate and artist in a killing the judge condemned for its horrific brutality.
In sentencing Erick Ottoniel Obando, 28, to two life terms plus 15 years in the January 2018 slaying of Kenneth H. Moore, Judge William Edward Tomko III of Prince George County Circuit Court noted that Moore was stabbed numerous times in the neck to the point that he was nearly decapitated.
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“Horrific case,” Tomko wrote in sentencing documents as his reason for his significant upward departure from discretionary state sentencing guidelines, which for Obando called for a punishment of between 26 years and two months at the low end and 43 years and seven months at the high end.
“Victim was singled out for his sexuality and vulnerability,” the judge said. “[The] victim was dumped off roadway in a different county. No acceptance of responsibility on the part of the defendant.”
Kenneth H. Moore
Obando was one of three men charged in the crime and the principal defendant who, according to evidence, slashed the throat of Moore, 36, whom they picked up at a convenience store at state Route 35 and Interstate 95 on the pretext of giving him a ride to Richmond.
But instead, the defendants took him to a house where Obando was staying in the 5400 block of Hair Road. He was robbed of his MacBook computer and iPhone and punched and kicked before Obando slashed his throat with a knife on Jan. 11, 2018.
“His spinal cord was severed,” said Prince George Commonwealth’s Attorney Susan Fierro, who prosecuted the case.
Moore, who at the time lived in Franklin, was hitchhiking to Richmond. A graduate of VCU, he had been a graduate student of Mary Washington University and was a prolific artist who had several exhibits in Richmond, Portsmouth and Fredericksburg.
Obando is a Guatemalan citizen who authorities said was residing illegally in the U.S. and living in Prince George at the time of the killing.
After Moore was killed, the defendants wrapped his body in plastic bags and drove it to a location on Jerusalem Plank Road in Sussex, where they dumped the remains in a watery ditch. A hunter discovered the body the next day.
The two co-defendants — Christopher Jared Crowder, then 18, of Dinwiddie, and Jacob Matthew Wadsworth, then 17, of Stoney Creek — pleaded guilty in 2019 to their roles in the robbery and killing. They testified against Obando at his August trial as a condition of their plea agreements. A jury found Obando guilty on all counts.
The gun was seized and the woman was cited.
According to evidence, Moore had been hitchhiking to Richmond, and a friend had given him a ride to the convenience store off I-95 but dropped him there because he couldn’t take him any farther. That’s when the defendants encountered Moore, who witnesses said was heavily intoxicated and disturbing other patrons at the store.
Moore bought two cases of beer and some cigarettes, and was overheard to say he was going to fill the defendants’ car with gas and they were going to take him to Richmond.
At Obando’s trial, it was disclosed that Moore had a blood-alcohol level of 0.20, or more than two times the presumptive legal intoxication limit to drive of 0.08. A toxicologist testified that the effects of that much alcohol in Moore’s system would have effected his judgment, such as not being able to pick up on social cues.
“Basically they saw him as an easy target and he was brutally murdered,” Fierro said.
A clerk told authorities she saw Moore attempt to kiss a Hispanic man — later identified as Obando — who pushed Moore away. After that encounter, another clerk heard Obando say, “I have a knife and will stab you.”
At Obando’s trial, Wadsworth testified that he himself was so intoxicated that, looking back on an encounter he had with Moore in the car as they were driving, he’s “not sure if Moore did make a pass at him or he was just kind of falling down drunk,” Fierro said. “So looking back, that is what was perceived, but I don’t know if that was actually what the intent was.”
During Obando’s sentencing hearing last week, Fierro played a portion of a YouTube video of Moore talking about his artwork during a 2013 exhibition at Art First Gallery in Fredericksburg.
Crowder was sentenced in May 2019 to serve nine years in prison for his role in the case. In a plea deal, he pleaded to voluntary manslaughter — reduced from first-degree murder — along with robbery, conspiracy to rob, concealing a dead body and conspiracy to conceal the body. He was sentenced to a total of 60 years with 51 years suspended.
In June 2019, Wadsworth pleaded guilty to similar charges. Under terms of his plea agreement, his active sentence was capped at nine years — the same as Crowder’s. With the Obando case concluded, Wadsworth is to be formally sentenced on Jan. 17.
29 photos from The Times-Dispatch archives
In February 1956, “Teen Age Party,” a televised music and dancing show for the younger crowd, was broadcast on Saturdays from the WRVA Theatre in downtown Richmond.
In 1963, Virginia Polytechnic Institute Associate Entomologist J.M. Amos demonstrated a mole trap. Though he said moles weren’t a gardener’s top enemy, their runways were used by other rodents that eat plant roots or bulbs.
This November 1971 image shows a monument in eastern Henrico County that commemorated the “calamitous year 1771” flood in Richmond. On another side, the monument included an inscription from Ryland Randolph citing 1772 and memorializing his parents.
In August 1953, members of the Monacan Junior Woman’s Club sought volunteers for the upcoming blood drive at Tuckahoe Elementary School in Henrico County. While Mrs. Allan J. Carter called prospects, Mrs. William F. Thornton worked at the typewriter.
In May 1963, Florence H. Rose outlined registration procedures to students Joan Voss and Harold Costley at the Richmond Youth Employment Center on Ninth Street downtown. By July that year, the center, operated by the Virginia Employment Commission and the Richmond Federation of Parent-Teacher Associations, had helped employ about 9 percent of Richmond’s youth.
In August 1968, trash was strewn along a street in downtown Richmond. In late June and early July, the eight-day “Fight Litter ’68” campaign gathered a cleanup force of 150 city workers and made progress in seven areas. But the Advertising Club of Richmond planned a follow-up appeal to city residents to join the local fight against litter.
In July 1959, a Tredegar Co. worker collected parts at the company’s new plant on Courthouse Road in Chesterfield County. One of company’s jobs at the time was doing machine work on missile stabilizers.
In February 1961, Adrienne Price, a senior at Westhampton College in Richmond, got ready for geography class. She recently had been voted “best dressed” at the school, which is affiliated with the University of Richmond.
In November 1944, Mrs. Alfred Adkins of Gordo, Ala., and her two young daughters visited the Travelers Aid Society in Richmond en route to Williamsburg, where her military husband was stationed. The society was a charter member of the Richmond War and Community Fund and offered travel assistance to servicemen and civilians.
In March 1990, a young bagpiper was part of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade procession on West Broad Street in Richmond.
In March 1954, Perry Sinnickson, 8, eagerly mounted a horse with little assistance from instructor Stewart Felvey. They were at the Deep Run Pony Club in Goochland County, a new equestrian program for juniors and the first club of its kind in Virginia.
In November 1964, St. Catherine’s School students Cindy McDonough (left) and Rozzie Kemper (right) accompanied teacher Lucile Tang Liu to class. Liu, the new Upper School librarian and a French and Chinese history teacher, was from China and moved to Richmond from Montreal as one of several international teachers added to the school faculty.
In June 1966, 8-year-old summer day camper Larry Harris surveyed the water facilities at Camp Thunderbird, which the YMCA opened that year in Chesterfield County. For more than 50 years before, the Boy Scouts had operated Camp Shawondasee there.
In December 1947, T.E. Burton Jr. diagnosed a patient at his doll hospital on Forest Hill Avenue in Richmond. Burton, a state Highway Department employee, was part-time chief surgeon at the doll hospital he ran out of his home. He got into the repair business when his two young daughters received as gifts antique china dolls that were badly in need of work. Burton averaged about 10 patients a week, with a busy season around the holidays.
In October 1982, Tim Smith checked the progress of a bunch of bananas in Highland Springs. His father, George, began cultivating the banana grove 10 years earlier after a friend gave him a plant as a gift. The plant grew and multiplied into 89 banana trees, ranging from 6-inch shoots to 18-foot trees. (George Smith said he didn’t eat the fruit — he grew them because he said they were beautiful plants.)
In June 1973, the pews were full at Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Richmond for a service marking the 50th anniversary of the ordination of the Most Rev. John J. Russell, retired bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Richmond.
In April 1985, Blanche Whitaker operated the elevator one last time at Central Fidelity Bank in downtown Richmond. Whitaker was retiring after more than three decades and was believed to be the last manual elevator operator in the city. With her departure, the bank planned to convert the elevator to automatic control.
In December 1991, the Westover Hills Neighborhood Association held a dedication ceremony for the recently erected bronze markers in the median on Westover Hills Boulevard in South Richmond.
In August 1989, Coppola’s Deli owner Joe Coppola (right) and manager Bill Gerloff carefully assembled a 40-foot Italian hero in the Carytown eatery. The giant sub required three cases of tomatoes, 50 pounds of cold cuts and 15 pounds of provolone cheese. The sandwich was made for the Carytown Watermelon Festival, where patrons could buy 5 inches for $5.
In November 1965, Richmond Mayor Morrill M. Crowe cut a ceremonial ribbon to mark the inauguration of the Eastern Airlines passenger service from Byrd Field to New York. The pilot for the flight, Capt. R.D. Tyler, and stewardess Margaret McLaughlin held the ribbon.
In November 1961, state Sen. John J. Wicker dressed as a colonist and, having flown to Boston, presented the governor of Massachusetts with documents — and live turkeys — to make the case that Virginia held the first Thanksgiving in 1619, two years before the Pilgrims held a celebration at Plymouth.
In January 1972, the Rev. Constantine N. Dombalis, leader of Saints Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church in Richmond, sprinkled holy water on the foreheads of two parishioners at the beginning of his tour to perform blessings of the homes for his 300 parishioners.
In July 1954, Mrs. Arthur Franklin worked on a display at Jeter’s, her harness shop at 221 E. Main St. in Richmond. The shop was founded in 1888 and had been a supplier of saddles and bridles for Abercrombie & Fitch, the New York sporting goods house. By the 1950s, a key customer was Colonial Williamsburg: It equipped its horses with harnesses and other accessories made by Jeter’s in strict accordance with 18th-century design.
In September 1975, handler Bobby Barlow showed off his basset hound, Champion Slippery Hill Hudson, who was named best in show at the Virginia Kennel Club dog show at the Arena in Richmond. At left is judge George C. Ehmig, and at right is show executive Lawrence W. Bracken Jr.
In October 1959, the rain-swollen Rivanna River flooded the Albemarle County Fairgrounds, postponing the opening of a carnival. A pelican that was part of a wildlife exhibit for the event stayed dry while tents and vehicles were under several feet of water.
In the 1960s, the Artmobile for the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts was essentially a rolling exhibit. The updated version, a museum and classroom on wheels, is expected to stop at schools, retirement facilities and community centers.
