DeSoto man who struck boy, mother 117 times with a bat pleads guilty to murder

Prosecutors say the man charged with beating an 8-year-old DeSoto boy to death and trying to kill the boy’s mother struck the two at least 117 times with a softball bat.

The attack on Deborah Snider and her son Leland Arnett, 8, occurred shortly after 11 p.m. on May 13, was captured on Marcus Moultrie’s cell phone. Moultrie, Snider’s on-again off-again boyfriend, pleaded guilty Monday to murder and attempted murder charges.

He had played softball that night and spent the evening out. After he came home, Snider confronted Moultrie about an affair she believed he was having, and told him she and the children planned to move out two days later.

The two began arguing, prosecutors said in court on Monday. Moultrie blocked the exit of Snider’s bedroom and forced her to the ground while she was holding their infant. Then he started striking her with the bat.

Prosecutors said Leland is heard repeating Marcus’ name several times about 3 minutes into the recording. Then there are more blows and the sounds of a little boy whimpering in pain.

When police arrived, they found Leland lying in a pool of blood in the kitchen, his mother critically injured in one of the bedrooms of their trailer. After police confiscated Snider’s phone, they counted what sounded like at least 117 blows with a softball bat directed at Snider and Leland.

‘Wanton cruelty’

Casey Bloodworth, sworn in as a special assistant Jackson County state’s attorney to prosecute the case, recounted these details in Jackson County court on Monday as the basis supporting Moultrie’s guilty plea, laying out the evidence prosecutors otherwise would have presented to the judge at a bench trial scheduled to begin that day.

Instead, Moultrie, 37, pleaded guilty to one count of murder with an enhancement for a killing that was “exceptionally brutal” and involved “wanton cruelty,” as well as one count of attempted murder. He faces a sentence of up to natural life in prison.

The family of six, including the children ages 11, 8, 6 and 1, lived in a little trailer on Hickory Street in DeSoto and had an extensive history with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. On the night of the beating, the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office received a 911 call from the 11-year-old who ran out of his house and to a neighbor for help, Bloodworth said.

The officer who responded to the scene found Leland and Snider bleeding profusely from their heads; Snider had also suffered severe facial trauma. Both were taken to Carbondale Memorial Hospital and then airlifted to hospitals in St. Louis. On May 17, Leland, a second-grader at DeSoto Grade School with an infectious smile and bright spirit,  died due to cerebral blunt force trauma. His skull was shattered, and his brain had significant hemorrhaging and chipping, Bloodworth told the judge.

Moultrie told the judge that he’d decided to enter an open guilty plea on his own accord. He was not offered any type of plea deal — the state sought the same charges and penalties it would have had he been found guilty in the bench trial. While Bloodworth recounted the grueling details of the murder, Moultrie hung his head low, but his voice was steady and he showed no visible emotion as he told the judge that he was guilty of the acts described.

But the account left most of those watching the proceedings shaken, with eyes seen welling up and sniffles audible throughout the courtroom. The brutal murder not only shocked the small town of DeSoto, population 1,500, about six miles north of Carbondale, it left the prosecutors who had processed the damning evidence disturbed as well. Before the start of the scheduled court hearing, three of them were seen walking into the courtroom each carrying a box of tissues.

Alleged murder-for-hire plot

Snider survived her injuries. She was present at the Oct. 1 hearing where courtroom documents alleged that Moultrie attempted to hire a fellow inmate to kill Snider for $1,500. Bloodworth had successfully argued before the judge last week to let him present evidence of the alleged murder-for-hire plot at the bench trial to show intent and “consciousness of guilt.” A separate charge in that matter has not been filed to date.

Snider was absent from the courtroom on Monday due to an unexpected medical issue.

Moultrie’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for Dec. 4. Bloodworth told the court he expects it to take a full day.

Daily Egyptian News Editor Brayden Guy can be reached at bguy@dailyegyptian.com

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