PITTSBURGH — The FBI says a Pittsburgh man who was serving a life sentence for murder when he escaped custody while attending his grandmother’s funeral nearly 50 years ago has been captured in Michigan.
Leonard Rayne Moses was arrested without incident in Grand Blanc, Michigan on Thursday by FBI Detroit's Fugitive Task Force.
Moses was 16 when he was convicted in the 1968 killing of Mary Amplo during civil unrest in Pittsburgh over the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. On April 6, 1968, during the Pittsburgh Riots, Moses along with other people, threw Molotov cocktails at a home in the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Homewood. Amplo was in the house at the time and died as a result of burns and pneumonia.
Moses escaped custody in 1971 and the FBI says he'd been living under the assumed name of Paul Dickson in Michigan. Moses was charged with stealing pills from a pharmacy earlier this year and the FBI said Friday the fingerprints from that arrest came back a match.
“I hope this arrest brings some closure to the family members of Mary Amplo, who was killed back in 1968,” said FBI Pittsburgh Special Agent in Charge Michael Christman. “Mr. Moses will now have to face justice for her murder. Through coordination with the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office and our partners in Michigan, we were able to identify Mr. Moses using the FBI’s Next Generation Identification system. It’s these new advances in technology that the FBI must continue to identify and use to make sure those who commit crimes are brought to justice.”
SOURCE: FBI
