Raymond Douglas Moody Wiki
Raymond Douglas Moody Biography
Who is Raymond Douglas Moody ?
A South Carolina s*x offender has been charged with the kidnapping, rape and murder of a 17-year-old girl from New York who disappeared on a spring break trip to Myrtle Beach 13 years ago.
Brittanee Marie Drexel was last seen April 2009 when she was walking between hotels in Myrtle Beach. Her de ella boyfriend of her de ella, who stayed home in Rochester, New York, became concerned when she stopped answering texts.
Arrested and Charged
Drexel was kidnapped that night by Raymond Douglas Moody, 62, who raped and strangled her to death before burying her body the next day in the woods, authorities confirmed during a press conference Monday.
Her body was found last Wednesday in Georgetown County, about 35 miles down the coast from where she disappeared. Dental records backed and DNA testing confirmed her identity.
Police said Moody, who has an ‘extensive s*x offender history,’ has been a target of the investigation dating back to 2011 but wasn’t arrested until this month.
He is currently being held without bail at the Georgetown County Jail.
State Law Enforcement Division Records revealed Moody was on South Carolina’s s*x offender registry for 1983 convictions in California for sodomy by force of someone under 14 and kidnapping.
Investigation
Drexel traveled to Myrtle Beach from Rochester in 2009 with some of her friends without telling her parents about her and she disappeared without a trace after leaving her friend’s hotel on April 25.
The local sheriff, Myrtle Beach police chief, FBI agent in charge of South Carolina and solicitor all said little Monday about what helped them crack Drexel’s case after 13 years of wild rumors that included stash houses for s*xual abuse victims’ bodies to be fed to alligators and rumored links to other missing women.
However, investigators revealed that after revisiting the evidence in Drexel’s case, they were drawn to Moody, who was living in Georgetown at the time of her disappearance.
Officials did not explain how they linked the ex-con to the missing teen, but said charges against him were made possible through ‘investigative findings’ and ‘evidence’ leading to the site where she was buried.
Police found Drexel’s remains de ella in a gated private drive on the outskirts of Georgetown on May 11, 2022 after a flurry of tips and investigation that included Moody’s arrest de ella May 4 on an obstruction of justice charge.
It is unclear if the s*x offender led police to her body de ella de ella himself.
In addition to his initial charge of obstruction of justice, Moody has been charged with murder, kidnapping and criminal s*xual conduct in the first degree.
The county attorney, speaking at Monday’s news conference, said officials would try to prosecute Moody to the fullest extent of the law.
“It’s a good day to soberly remember Brittanee and all that she and her family have been through,” said Georgetown County Attorney Jimmy Richardson. “Obviously justice will never be good enough. That is the fallacy of all this, that somehow we will do everything possible to make Raymond Moody pay for what he has done here. But that’s not going to replace Brittanee.’
Over the past 13 years, rumors of Drexel’s disappearance have made national headlines and multiple searches have been conducted in South Carolina in hopes of finding the teenager.
In August 2016, an FBI agent gave the first detailed account of what authorities believe happened to him, based on the account of a jailed man who said he saw Drexel’s horrific last moments and made a confession in jail, according to the Post and Courier.
Taquan Brown of Walterboro told deputies in 2016 that he entered a ‘hide house’ in the days after Drexel’s abduction and saw a 16-year-old felon ‘s*xually abusing’ her.
Brown said he then went outside to give the boy’s father some money and saw Drexel run out of the house but was caught and ‘pistolized’.
The inmate said she was then dragged back into the house, and Brown said he heard two gunshots and then saw the girl’s body wrapped up and removed.
Police had previously said they believed the high school student was held for at least three days against her will near McClellanville, where they tracked her cell phone signals after her disappearance.
Munoz, at the time, also said multiple witnesses claimed the teen’s body had been thrown into an ‘alligator pit’ and ‘eaten by alligators.’
None of these accounts turned out to be accurate.
Raymond Douglas Moody Quick and Facts
- Brittanee Drexel, 17, was kidnapped, raped, strangled and killed in April 2009
- The upstate New Yorker went missing while on spring break in Myrtle Beach, SC
- Her body was found last week about 35 miles from where she disappeared
- Police charged ex-con and s*x offender Raymond Moody, 62, with her death
- He had been a target of the investigation since 2011 and was arrested this month
- Moody has an ‘extensive s*x offender history’ and remains jailed without bail
- Drexel’s parents are thankful to finally have closure and now seek justice for her
