The man convicted of killing Brittanee Drexel admitted that his girlfriend was present on the night he went out ‘hunting’ for young girls and watched as he raped and killed the teenager.
Raymond Moody, now 64, was sentenced to life in prison after leading authorities to Drexel’s body in May 2022, putting an end to a decades-long cold case.
The New York teen, then-17, went missing on April 25, 2009 while on a spring break trip to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
She was kidnapped by Moody, who raped and killed her before burying her body the next day.
Investigators said in 2012 that Moody was considered a person of interest in her case but he was never charged and the case grew quiet.
A break in the case came in May 2022 when he was arrested on an obstruction of justice charge.
According to police, that’s when he admitted to raping and killing Drexel, and he was then sentenced to consecutive terms of 30 years on the charges of kidnapping and criminal sexual conduct, and a life sentence on the murder charge.
Moody’s girlfriend Angel Cooper Vause, 56, was arrested in 2023 on charges in connection to the rape and murder of Drexel, and pleaded guilty to all three counts of making false statements to the FBI.
The girlfriend of Raymond Moody, Angel Cooper Vause, now 56, will be sentenced in February for her involvement in the murder of Brittanee Drexel in 2009
The body of Brittanee Drexel, 17, was found May 2022, nearly 13 years after she disappeared while on spring break in South Carolina’s Myrtle Beach in April 2009
A break in the case came in May 2022 when Raymond Drexel was arrested on an obstruction of justice charge. According to police, that’s when he admitted to raping and killing Drexel
Ahead of Vause’s sentencing next month, Moody has claimed that not only was she with him as he viciously strangled Drexel, but she was part of the plot to abduct and rape the teen, according to a federal sentencing memorandum obtained by People.
Moody’s claim comes from an interview he gave to the FBI in November at Liber Correctional Institution in Ridgeville on November 13.
Speaking to investigators, Moody said that he and Vause went out ‘hunting’ for young girls on the night they abducted the teenager.
He also claimed that Vause had sent him a text just before their ‘hunt’, in which she told him she ‘had always fantasized about snatching some girl.’
Moody replied to Vause with, ‘That’s all you needed to say to me.’ and asked her:’so you want to go hunting with me, huh?’.
She replied, ‘Yeah.»
He told the special agents that the text triggered and surprised him because he was not seriously contemplating that type of criminal activity with Vause because he said he usually did that alone.
They first attempted the abduction on April 24, 2009, the night before Drexel was taken, but he said they had ‘some phone activity’ and Moody was concerned about leaving an electronic footprint.
Drexel was picked up by Raymond Moody and then later assaulted and killed by Moody
Surveillance footage on April 25, 2009, caught Drexel leaving the Blue Water Resort, after visiting a friend wearing a teal and black shirt she had texted her friends about
Bar Harbor Resort on Myrtle Beach, where Drexel was staying at the time of her disappearance
A memorial tree honoring Drexel was planted in Grand Park near Myrtle Beach in 2012
The following night, Moody and Vause came across Drexel walking alone from The Blue Water resort to the Bar Harbor in Myrtle Beach.
After driving past Drexel twice, Moody claimed it was Vause who helped lure the teen to their car by claiming they were tourists and offered her a ride back to her hotel.
Moody added that Vause was the one who spoke to Drexel in order to ‘soften her up and maybe even earn her trust.’
Once Drexel had gotten into the car, Moody had Vause take the wheel so he could restrain the teen in the backseat.
The couple then took Drexel to a tent they already had set up at the Pole Yard Boat Landing in Georgetown.
Vause had time to release Drexel while Moody was away, but did not, he told investigators.
Moody then said that after raping Drexel he strangled her with a rope, according to the document.
Moody said that he does not recall Vause taking part in the killing and said that she was unaware of his intentions to kill Drexel after the rape.
He noted, however, that she was in the tent during the murder and that she did not try to stop him.
Moody later buried his victim alone at a construction site.
Moody’s interview came after he agreed to provide the ‘complete and truthful information about the abduction, rape, and murder of Brittanee’ in exchange for the Drexel family’s allowance of a portion of Moody’s property to remain in a trust for Vause’s grandchildren.
In November 2022, chilling texts Drexel had sent to her boyfriend the night she vanished were revealed.
She had texted her friends throughout the day, court documents revealed at the time, reaching out to her boyfriend in her hometown of Rochester, New York, to complain about something less than one hour before she was reported missing.
‘I’ll tell you later when you call me,’ Drexel told her boyfriend, adding: ‘I’m so heated.’
Drexel later told him she was planning to just stay in that night and pack before going to sleep.
Throughout the day, the teen sent text messages to her boyfriend, her friends she voyaged to Myrtle Beach with, as well as people she met while on vacation there.
In one text, Drexel tells a friend she had borrowed a pair of shorts and made plans to meet at their hotel later in the day to return them.
And in another, she tells a friend she ‘went for [a] walk’ and asked ‘what’s going on tonite?’
Drexel also talks about her outfit, describing the teal and black shirt she was later seen wearing in surveillance footage at the Blue Water Resort, after visiting a friend.
By 8:58 pm, Drexel sent her boyfriend one last text message reading: ‘I’m staying in packing and going to sleep probably.’
Although the phone records show no other messages from the teen, her boyfriend and her friends grew increasingly worried about her lack of a response.
One texted, ‘Send me something, we think ur missing.’ Another told Drexel to ‘stop playing games,’ while her boyfriend simply wrote: ‘Babe im concerned.’
Throughout the night, the court documents say, Drexel’s phone continued to ping off different locations in the Myrtle Beach area before it died at 11:57 pm.
Her body was ultimately found buried in a shallow grave on the property of Moody’s Georgetown home.
Her remains were positively identified using dental records and DNA. A coroner later determined that Drexel died from strangulation.
