Man pleaded guilty to murdering neighbor and had funeral pamphlet with victim’s name at home

Courtesy: Sumter County Sheriff’s Office

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(AP) — A former South Carolina police officer pleaded guilty to killing his neighbor after investigators found a trove of physical evidence linking him to the crime, including blood-stained clothing and a funeral pamphlet at his home that read “RIP Oscar” and “you.” . Authorities said it read “You must love your neighbor.”

Justin Rawlins Moody, 43, was sentenced to 34 years in prison Monday after pleading guilty to murder shortly before his trial began in Greenwood County, attorney David Stumbo said. a statement.

Deputies say 48-year-old Oscar Rubio’s girlfriend found him dead in his Ware Shoals home in May 2023, shot in the head and chest.

Neighbors told officers responding to the shooting that Rubio and Moody had recently argued and that Moody had borrowed money from his neighbor in the past. Moody refused to leave his home to find a deputy until someone he knew arrived.

Stumbo said that when Moody spoke to investigators, he said he did not kill Rubio but knew an extraordinary amount of information about what happened.

Officers later asked him how he knew so much, and Stumbo said Moody “claimed he was God and could hear other people’s thoughts.”

Deputies found the gun used to kill Rubio in Moody’s bedroom, blood splattered on pants hanging from the kitchen chair, boots in Moody’s home that resembled the distinctive blood trail in the victim’s home, $1,000 in cash belonging to Rubio and his keys. Prosecutors said the vehicle was also found along with a funeral pamphlet that read “RIP Oscar” and “you must love your neighbor.”

Moody worked as a law enforcement officer for at least six different South Carolina agencies starting in 2006, according to South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy records.

He worked two assignments in Laurens County for four years, a year in Greenville County and nearly three years in Richland County before leaving law enforcement for good in October 2018, his records show.

No agency said Moody was fired or should not be hired elsewhere, records show, although one agency was upset that he left after less than five months and took a job at another agency.