Arrests offer glimpse of sect

Peter Lucas Moses Jr. collected a cast of women over the past six years, rekindling a high school flame and romancing others he met in Durham and as far away as Colorado.

With them, he patched together what some would call a sordid family. He fathered children with the women who could have them and kept his growing brood under lock and key. The women pulled farther and farther away from their own families and into Moses' grasp, relatives of the women said.

For five years, Moses, 27, and a handful of women and their children bounced from apartment to apartment in Durham and Colorado, chased by eviction notices or fear of getting in trouble with police.Now, Moses is in serious trouble. He's charged with kidnapping, assault and threatening a girlfriend with a gun; another of his girlfriends, Vania Sisk, is facing a marijuana charge.

But police are trying to build a much bigger case: They are searching for the bodies of two people they believe Moses and Sisk killed.

In February, a police officer's knock on Moses' door unraveled his world. Durham police were looking for Antoinetta McKoy, a woman reported missing by her family. McKoy, a former high school sweetheart of Moses, had gone to Durham to visit him in December.

Instead, they met Zayna Thomas, another of Moses' girlfriends, who told them an unimaginable tale.

Thomas, identified in court documents as "ZT," told police that Moses killed 5-year-old Jadon Higganbothan, Sisk's son. She also told police that Sisk and another woman, LaRonda Smith, beat McKoy as she tried to escape. She told them that Sisk, under Moses' order, shot and killed McKoy.

Thomas also described a belief system and lifestyle that Durham police have since labeled a cult affiliated with Black Hebrews, a religious sect that believes a race war will culminate in blacks' dominance.

Thomas acknowledged her role in the investigation by phone last week but declined to say more.

Moses' father, Pete Moses Sr., denied the allegations.

"He ain't in no cult," the father said. "Them girls just crazy like that."

According to search warrants, police have found some evidence to suggest foul play inside Moses' house on Pear Tree Lane: spots that looked like blood, a fired bullet and shell casing, and indications that areas of the house had been vigorously cleaned.

Arrests in Durham

As police search drainage ditches and forests for the bodies of McKoy and Jadon, families of the women who've survived want their daughters back in their world.

Willie Harris saw his daughter, Lavada Harris, a week ago for what he said was the first time in nearly a year. She seemed small and frail outside a courtroom at the Durham County jail, where she had come to see Moses appear before a judge.

Harris hugged his daughter and told her to come home. She told her father she loved Moses and needed to take care of some things.

"It's like she can't hear me," Harris said. "Like she's under some sort of spell."