A man who fled from Georgia State Patrol troopers and crashed almost two years ago, killing his 12-year-old passenger, was sentenced to 15 years in prison this week after pleading guilty in Paulding County.
Charlie Wilson Moore, 37, was under the influence of alcohol in September 2021 when he refused to roll down his window for troopers, according to investigators. Moore led authorities on a chase, and when a trooper used a pursuit immobilization technique, or PIT maneuver, Wilson’s car left the road and overturned in a ditch. Le’Den Boykins, the backseat passenger, was ejected and died in the crash.
On May 2, Moore pleaded guilty to first-degree vehicular homicide and aggravated assault on an officer. He had been indicted on murder charges.
With tears in his eyes, and wearing a surgical mask, Moore turned to Boykins’ parents, Anthony Boykins and Toni Franklin, who were seated behind him in court during his sentencing Monday.
“I want to let you know that I’m deeply sorry that I have anything to do with losing Le’Den. I love him like he’s mine,” Moore said. “I’ve never let fear control me, and I let things go too far. So if you can, please, please forgive me.”
What didn’t come up, either in the sentencing hearing or in court earlier this month, was the role the GSP played in the crash.
Recordings of 911 communications show that during the chase, Moore was on the phone with a dispatcher and said he had children in the car. The recordings show Paulding County 911 was trying to relay that information to the GSP, but word didn’t get to Trooper David Peterson before he used the PIT maneuver.
The State Patrol’s pursuit policy says that children being present in a car is a factor that can affect the safety of a PIT maneuver, but it does not expressly forbid going forward. Peterson has denied that he knew children were in the car, even though he stood by the driver’s-side window when he interacted with Moore before the chase.
“Due to the confrontational driver, I was unable to take my main focus off the driver,” Peterson wrote in the incident report. “The only other thing I noticed inside the vehicle was someone in the passenger seat, but due to the lighting conditions and only seeing the person from my peripheral vision, I was only able to tell that the person looked large in size, like an adult. I was unable to clearly see if anyone was in the back (seat) due to the window tint on the vehicle.”
Moore had been held at the Paulding jail since his arrest, booking records show.
On Sept. 9, 2021, at about 1:05 a.m., the trooper began following a Kia Sorento that he spotted going 10 miles over the speed limit on Bethel Church Road in Paulding, the trooper testified. The driver, later identified as Moore, came to a stop on a residential street but refused to lower his window for the trooper, instead demanding to speak to a supervisor. The trooper then requested help from the Paulding sheriff’s office and deputies quickly arrived.
“The male driver, who was later determined to be under the influence of alcohol, failed to comply with the deputy and trooper’s requests to roll down his window and provide his license and other pertinent information,” Sgt. Ashley Henson with the Paulding sheriff’s office said after the arrest. “At the conclusion of the incident, it was discovered that the male driver had a suspended driver’s license as well. It was then that the Paulding deputy broke the driver’s-side window out of the vehicle.”
That’s when Moore fled, investigators previously said. A high-speed pursuit followed onto Ga. 92, where Moore was driving recklessly, the GSP said. The Kia left the road and overturned in a ditch after the PIT maneuver.
Moore and his front-seat passenger, his son, 14-year-old Blake Zyier, were both treated for minor injuries. But Boykins, who lived in Douglasville, died in the crash. He was not wearing a seatbelt, according to investigators.
— Staff writer Asia Simone Burns contributed to this article.
