By Marlene Lenthang -
NBC News
The 19-year-old accused of shooting a woman, a television journalist and a 9-year-old girl in Orlando, Florida, this Wednesday is a “known gang member” with a long criminal history that includes arrests for robbery and charges of domestic violence, according to authorities and his criminal record.
Keith Melvin Moses was arrested Wednesday night on charges of the slayings in the Pine Hills area, a city of 66,000 west of Orlando.
Armed with a Glock 40 pistol, he is accused of fatally shooting a woman, whom police say he knew, and who was found dead around 11 am.
In the afternoon, he allegedly returned to the scene, opening fire on a reporter and a cameraman from the local television station Spectrum News 13 who had come to report on the event, and later entered a house and shot a mother and his 9 year old daughter.
The journalist and the girl died;
the minor's mother and the cameraman are hospitalized in critical condition.
Moses, 19. Orange County Sheriff's Office.
Orange County Sheriff John Mina said the suspect is a "known gang member."
Authorities are still investigating his motives and so far the suspect has not been cooperative, he said.
Years of criminal history but on the street
Moses has a criminal history dating back to January 2018, when he was 14, and extending to 2022, according to Florida criminal records.
The most serious crimes include grand theft, assault, domestic violence, and armed robbery.
He was arrested in January 2018 on one count of auto theft, which was amended to misdemeanor trespassing in Orange County court.
He was sentenced the following month to one year of community control, which is essentially house arrest.
That sentence contemplates that a person is confined to his home, except for the time he is at work, school, dedicated to public service or other activities approved by the officer in charge of his case, according to the Florida Department of Corrections.
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That same month, Moses was arrested and charged with domestic violence with battery, touching or beating, according to records.
He pleaded not guilty and was sentenced to a concurrent year of community control.
In 2015, he was arrested again, this time for robbery.
He pleaded not guilty and the case was dismissed.
In the following years, he was arrested for allegedly resisting an agent and violating the conditions of his release, according to records.
He was re-arrested several times for failing to appear in court.
Moses was also arrested in 2018 on charges of robbery with a weapon, which was amended in court to attempted robbery with a firearm.
He pleaded not guilty and was given a concurrent sentence of "restrictive commitment level low risk residential."
In 2021, he was arrested for breaching the conditions imposed and charged with possession of less than 20 grams of marijuana, a misdemeanor.
The case ended up archived.
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The last time he was arrested was on April 28, 2022 by the Orlando police, accused of failing to appear in court.
Florida's Ninth Judicial Circuit District Attorney Monique H. Worrell addressed his previous convictions Thursday: “There's been a lot of conversation, 'Well, why was he on the street?'” she said.
"Florida law prohibits me from discussing the details of any juvenile disposition [...] but I will say that juvenile dispositions do not qualify as convictions."
He said that, legally, the Department of Juvenile Justice has jurisdiction when a minor is sentenced.
“That means neither the court nor the Prosecutor's Office has a say in what ultimately is the program or the length of time a child is kept in a program,” Worrell said.
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The prosecutor noted that the suspect's only adult offense was possession of marijuana.
Her office did not charge him because when the amount is so low, "the Florida Department of Law Enforcement does not test the substance and that means the State's Attorney's Office cannot prove the case."
She added that she has proposed to legislators that juvenile justice rules be changed to extend the period they can be detained.
How the shooting unfolded
Moses was arrested Wednesday night, charged with the first murder.
Mina said she is confident the suspect will be charged with the other attacks.
She allegedly shot the woman found dead in the morning, identified as Nathacha Augustin, 38, as she was sitting in a car with a friend, Mina said.
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Moses returned to the scene about four hours later, around 4 p.m., and shot Dylan Lyons, a reporter for Spectrum News 13, and Jesse Walden, a photojournalist, who were in or near a car, according to Mina.
Lyons died and Walden was hospitalized in critical condition Wednesday night.
Moses then entered a house in the area and shot the mother and daughter.
The girl, T'yonna Major, died, and her mother, who has not been identified, is in critical condition as of late Wednesday.
It is not clear what prompted the shooting.
Mina stated that Moses was an "acquaintance" of Augustin's, and that he had no relationship with the journalists, the mother, or T'yonna.
According to Mina, witnesses identified him as a suspect in the shooting and video footage also captured him at the scene at the time of the massacre.
Agents found him and he was uncooperative when they took him into custody.
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Agents recovered a handgun, the Glock 40 found empty and "hot to the touch," believed to have been used in the shooting, Mina said.
The sheriff said it's unclear how he got the gun and that Moses was taken to a hospital claiming he was injured, where he got into a fight with hospital staff and had to be restrained.
When he was taken to the sheriff's office for an interview, he "pretended to be asleep" and was uncooperative.
At one point, he physically resisted the officers and had to be subdued, Mina said.
Now the suspect "doesn't talk" to police, he added. He withdrew from his initial court appearance Thursday afternoon and was ordered to remain in jail without bail, to have no contact with witnesses or family and not to possess guns, knives or weapons. weapons.
