Convicted Sex Offender Is Sentenced To 27 Months For Threatening To Kill Gaston County District Attorney And State Prosecutor

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – U.S. Attorney Andrew Murray announced today that Larry Brandon Moore, 31, of Gastonia, N.C. was sentenced to 27 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for threatening to kill Gaston County District Attorney Locke Bell and Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Deborah Gulledge.    

John A. Strong, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Charlotte Division, joins U.S. Attorney Murray in making today’s announcement.

According to court documents and court proceedings, on March 1, 2017, while incarcerated in the Avery Mitchell Correctional Institution in Spruce Pine, N.C., Moore mailed a letter to a ADA Gulledge, in which he threatened to kill her and to murder her family.  ADA Gulledge had successfully prosecuted Moore on state charges for sexually exploiting a minor, which resulted in Moore’s conviction and incarceration.  Moore also threatened to kill two detectives employed by the Gastonia Police Department. 

On or about March 1, 2017, Moore also sent a letter to Gaston County District Attorney Locke Bell, threatening to kill Mr. Bell’s family, to punish the District Attorney and to hold him accountable for ADA Gulledge’s actions.

Moore pleaded guilty to two counts of mailing threatening communications. 

In announcing today’s sentence, U.S. District Judge Robert J. Conrad, Jr. stated in open court, “The fact that the defendant committed the offense while serving an active term of incarceration for exploitation of a minor justified a sentence at the very top of the sentencing guideline range.”

The FBI led the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Dana Washington, of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Charlotte, prosecuted the case.