Blanche Taylor Moore on the stand at her trial: I've been a very giving person

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story originally ran on Nov. 9, 1990, during Blanche Taylor Moore's trial on first-degree murder charges in the death of Raymond Reid.

Blanche Taylor Moore would not say Thursday that those who had testified against her during her murder trial had lied, but she said that her memory of certain events differed from theirs.

She said she neither fed Raymond C. Reid food from her home while he was sick, nor gave arsenic-tainted food to any of the other men she is accused of poisoning over a 23-year period. "I know arsenic was found in those people, but it's not because I put it there because I did not do it."

Mrs. Moore, 57, was the last witness in her defense against a first-degree murder charge in the 1986 poisoning death of Mr. Reid, whom she dated for many years. Mr. Reid was originally thought to have died of a rare nerve disorder. But his body was exhumed last year and officials found that he had been given doses of arsenic over many weeks before he died, including a fatal dose administered while he was in the hospital.

Closing arguments are scheduled to begin Monday.

Mrs. Moore spent more than six hours on the stand Thursday in front of about 250 people who filled the benches of the Forsyth County Superior Court and stood four-deep along the back wall. She spoke slowly and deliberately, taking time to gather her thoughts and her emotions. She paused occasionally to fight back tears, mostly when she was speaking of Mr. Reid, whom she said she loved very much. They would have married had he lived, she said.

She refuted testimony by earlier witnesses who said that she did not appear to be grieving over Mr. Reid's death -- that she was laughing and talking at the funeral home. She said she did not recall doing that. "I was hurt," she said. "I was hurt very badly when Raymond died."

Mrs. Moore said she is a private person who keeps her grief to herself.

"I've been in jail for 16 months," she told the jury. "I've cried myself to sleep every night. But it's not so those people in that cell would know I'm doing it."

Mrs. Moore said she did not recall feeding Mr. Reid in the hospital before he died. But under cross-examination she told Janet H. Branch, assistant district attorney, that if the hospital staff asked her to do so, "Certainly I would have done that. I would do anything they asked me to do for him. Anything."

She also said she did not remember having said, as witnesses testified earlier, that her second husband, the Rev. Dwight W. Moore, was evil.

"I don't recall ever criticizing Dwight," she said.

Mr. Moore, who has attended the proceedings for the past several weeks, laughed occasionally at his wife's testimony Thursday. He is still recovering from the effects of severe arsenic poisoning. Mrs. Moore has been charged with assault in his case and will be tried for that later.

Ms. Branch, in her questioning, attempted to show that Mrs. Moore harbored a hatred of men who had vices such as gambling or engaging in extra-marital affairs. Her father, Parker Davis Kiser Sr., left her mother for another woman when Mrs. Moore was a girl. Her first husband, James N. Taylor, was a gambler who lost many a paycheck during weekend card games early in their marriage. Mr. Reid enjoyed gambling from time to time, and Mr. Moore has admitted to having had an affair that lasted some 16 years while he was married to his first wife.

All four of the men were found to have ingested large amounts of arsenic. Two of them died of arsenic poisoning.

Ms. Branch said that the timing of Mr. Reid's death -- and Mrs. Moore's subsequent receipt of a third of his insurance benefits -- came when her cash had begun to dwindle. She suggested that Mrs. Moore had engineered the writing of Mr. Reid's will while he was incapacitated in the days before his death.

"I had nothing to do with the writing of that will," she said.

In fact, she told the court under direct questioning by her attorney, Mitchell M. McIntire, that in her life she had not been motivated by money but by a love for her church and her family.

"I've just tried to be there for others and to help whenever I could," she said. "And I've been a very giving person.

"What's kept me going through this -- I've been in jail a long time and it's been hard -- is to know my faith in God, the love of my family and friends, and my innocence that I sit right here trying to project."