During the prosecution of 66-year-old Claudel Moore, key body camera footage of an eyewitness interview with an officer went missing, a judge found that Berkeley police violated the defendant’s Miranda rights by baiting him into an implicit confession, and the defense accused police of a warrantless search, while also referencing a sergeant’s documented history of sending racist texts to colleagues. Despite the scrutiny, Moore’s use of a distinctive Cadillac during the killing of 47-year-old Anthony Joshua Fisher was enough to tie him to the crime, according to court records.
“There might not be two blue and white Cadillacs like that in the city of Oakland,” Judge Scott Patton said at Moore’s preliminary hearing last year. “It’s a very distinctive, beautiful car.”
Moore was accused of fatally shooting Fisher outside a Seventh Street apartment on March 4, 2022. Fisher initially survived being shot in the head but died at a hospital four days later. The Cadillac was more recognized by eyewitnesses than Moore’s face, and police later located the vehicle under a tarp in Richmond. Moore and his girlfriend were found and arrested at a Pinole hotel, the same day Fisher died, court records show. An online fundraiser by his daughter refers to him as a “goofy, loving, sensitive, teddy bear” who was loved by many.
Fisher’s brother testified at the preliminary hearing that he saw Fisher leaving the apartment with “friends” and heard a gunshot echo out from the street moments later. He rushed to the balcony and spotted two things: his brother on the sidewalk, suffering from a gunshot wound, and the Cadillac making its escape.
“I rushed downstairs to come to his aid and I looked to my left and I saw the car pull off and turn the corner,” Fisher’s brother testified. “He was alert. His eyes were just moving around. (I) told him to hang in there, somebody is coming.”
After the shooting, Officer Alex Villarroel interviewed one of Fisher’s neighbors who reported recognizing the suspect, and once again the Cadillac came into play. The witness told Villarroel that he had helped Moore jump the Cadillac at the same location just days earlier, and recognized both the shooter and the car. Villarroel’s interaction with the man was captured on the officer’s body camera, but the footage later went missing, according to court records.
Prosecutors, though, scoffed at a defense motion that accused Villarroel of deleting the footage, arguing that this was pure speculation and that the missing footage hurt prosecutors more than the defense. The eyewitness testified in court and confirmed his identification of Moore, according to the preliminary hearing transcript.
Moore’s lawyer, Deputy Public Defender Russell Mangan, also accused police of an illegal search of the hotel where they allegedly found bullets and a revolver holster and arrested Moore. In another court filing, he accused one of the investigators, Sgt. Darren Kacalek, of racism, noting Kacalek’s involvement in a texting scandal. A report by the city’s police accountability board found Kacalek made fun of a colleague’s “Obama phone” when reviewing a blurry video and on another occasion criticized a media article for not mentioning a suspect’s race, adding, “I guess he isn’t Black.”
Kacalek was put on administrative leave over the scandal but later returned to work, according to media reports.
During Moore’s arrest, another officer baited him into making an incriminating statement, Judge Patton found at the preliminary hearing. When Moore demanded to know why his girlfriend was also being detained, Det. Joshua Smith said that Moore had failed to do the “chivalrous thing.” Moore replied, “Y’all already know what the thing is,” implying that police were aware of his own guilt.
That statement, Patton ruled at the preliminary hearing, was inadmissible “based on a violation of (Moore’s) Miranda rights.” He added that his ruling was a “very close call.”
Moore has been formally sentenced but remains at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin for now. At Moore’s Feb. 9 sentencing hearing, his daughter decried the eight-year sentence as insufficient to “account for the life my father was denied,” the news site Berkeleyside reported.
“His murder did not just end his life. It shattered our family forever,” Fisher’s daughter said at the hearing. “An eight-year sentence does not reflect the gravity of the choice to purposely take his life.”
About the Author
Discover more from USA NEWS
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
