A Texas woman has pleaded guilty to the brutal murder of her neighbor, a killing so violent and chaotic that first responders found the victim dead of a gunshot wound and the suspect fleeing the scene drenched in blood, and seemingly detached from reality.
Fifty-four-year-old Cynthia Ming admitted responsibility for the Sept. 7, 2022, killing of 45-year-old Angie Melissa Moore inside Moore’s home in Lacy Lakeview, Texas. Moore had called 911 moments earlier, reporting that Ming was attempting to break into her house through a window. By the time police arrived, Moore had been shot in the head, and Ming was running from the home unclothed and blood-soaked.
Court documents obtained by NBC affiliate KCEN reveal Ming told officers she “grabbed the gun” from Moore and shot her because she believed Moore had “killed her dog.” According to CBS affiliate KWTX, Ming went further, claiming she “then drank her blood.”
Doctors later testified that Ming said she had been “electrocuted” by a live wire in her own house shortly before the killing and recalled wandering around “bugged out.” She told Dr. Lee Carter, “The last thing I remember is the light fixture… then I was talking to the law-dogs about what I did… and I don’t even remember it.”
Carter diagnosed Ming with borderline personality disorder, histrionic personality disorder, and schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type, but concluded she was sane at the time of the crime.
Ming initially pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity but reversed course one week later, accepting responsibility and agreeing to a 50-year prison sentence. She will be eligible for parole in 25 years, though prosecutors said they doubt it will ever be granted given the “nature of the crime.”
“Since Ming will almost certainly never leave prison, this plea agreement achieves the same outcome a conviction for capital murder would have,” prosecutors Duncan Widmann and Luke McCowan said, adding that avoiding trial spared the victim’s family from the uncertainties that often accompany insanity claims.
Moore’s family filled the courtroom during sentencing. Her parents read aloud from a song written by Moore’s 16-year-old son, Connor, who described Ming as “Satan’s puppet” and said, “She shed my mother’s innocent blood.” Moore’s mother called Ming “a force of pure evil that lived across the street,” alleging her daughter endured years of “aggressive, demonic harassing” before the fatal attack.
