Florida cops have released a new booking photo for the deranged teenage gunman who killed three people, including a journalist, during what they believe to be a drugged-up crime spree, in which he appears crazed with wide, dilated eyes.
Keith Melvin Moses, 19, is in custody for shooting dead Nathacha Augustin, 38, journalist Dylan Lyons, and nine-year-old T’Yonna Major last Wednesday in Pine Hills near Orlando.
Moses has refused to explain his rampage, which began with shooting Augustin at around 11am while they were in his cousin’s car.
It’s unclear if he was tested for drugs after the rampage, or what the results of those tests are, but after his arrest, police said he appeared to be ‘high’.
Keith Melvin Moses, 19, is in custody for shooting dead Nathacha Augustin, 38, journalist Dylan Lyons, and nine-year-old T’Yonna Major last Wednesday. Police say he was high at the time of the killings, and that they haven’t been able to determine any motive for the murders
In new records released today, his cousin described him as acting ‘strange’ and ‘sweating’ in the car before he pulled out his gun and shot Augustin in the chin.
Lyons, a 24-year-old reporter for Spectrum 13 News, went to the scene of the first murder to film a report.
That is when Moses returned, shot him in the chest at point blank range, and shot his cameraman, Jesse Walden, in the groin.
He then let himself into T’Yonna Major’s nearby home, entering through a sliding door.
He shot T’Yonna twice in the stomach and also injured her mother before fleeing the house.
The pair barricaded themselves in the bathroom of their home and waited for police. T’Yonna later died of her injuries.
Police found Moses in the street and took him into custody.
The 19-year-old was due in court last week but missed his first appearance. In court filings, his attorney listed ‘mental health’ as the reason for his absence.
Previously-released bodycam footage showed him screaming ‘I can’t breathe!’ as cops approached him.
Nathacha Augustin, 38, was the first victim. She was in a car with Moses’ cousin when they offered him a ride. He got into the backseat but started sweating and ‘acting strange’ according to the cousin. He then shot Augustin in the chin and fled
Dylan Lyons, 24, was shot and killed while reporting on a shooting in Pine Hills, Florida, yesterday. He was just six months into his job at Spectrum News 13. T’Yonna Major, nine, was also killed by the gunman
Moses smirked and smiled as he was taken away in handcuffs after being arrested in connection to the three killings in Orlando, Florida
Once in custody, he pretended to be asleep, refusing to answer any of the officers’ questions.
The new documents reveal how he also tried to let himself out of the police interview room once the officers had left him alone.
Moses, 19, has a long rap sheet including felony charges including possession of a firearm by a minor and robbery with a deadly weapon.
Almost all occurred when he was a minor and he’d finished serving any relative custodial sentences for them.
The only charge on his record to have occurred when he was an adult was marijuana possession, but it was in such a low quantity (4.6 grams) that it did not warrant a jail sentence.
Now, he is facing life in prison – if not the death penalty – on multiple first degree murder charges.
It was Moses’ cousin who first called police after he shot Augustin.
The cousin, who is not named, was in a car with Augustin when they saw Moses walking down the street.
Jesse Walden is a photojournalist who was injured in a Florida shooting rampage that took the life of his reporter colleague Dylan Lyons and a nine-year-old girl
Walden is expected to be released from the hospital within a day or two, but knows he faces a long road of recovery. He also faces the pain of losing his friend
The cousin offered him a ride, which he accepted, and he got in the backseat of the car.
‘He stated that when Keith Moses was in the vehicle, he was acting strange and was sweating before the shooting.’
Walden, the cameraman and photographer who survived the shooting, told how he hid behind a wheel of the car while Moses opened fire.
He was retrieving gear from the trunk of the car while Lyons was sitting in the passenger seat.
Moses approached the car and first shot Walden.
Orange County Sheriff’s Deputies reported to the 6100 block of Hialeah Street in Orlando at around 11:17 a.m. where they discovered a woman who had been fatally shot in the passenger seat of a car
He then walked to the front of the vehicle, where the driver’s door was open, and fired into the car to shot Lyons once in the chest.
‘As I’m about to open my trunk, I hear gunshots and I feel that I get hit. I feel some pain in my groin.
‘I guess whoever this guy is, there’s something wrong with him, but he was shooting people that were parked there.
‘Dylan was a reporter I worked with every day. We were best friends. He was just a sweet guy, he was young.
‘He really did a good job, he loved trying hard and that’s what we like to do, we like to push the boundaries and we like to get our hands dirty,’ he said.
‘It’s so unfair that it happened to Dylan, that he died,’ he said.
