A second-grade teacher and her ex-husband were found dead in an apparent murder-suicide in suburban Illinois last week.
It happened after 64-year-old real estate agent Matthew Moore illegally entered the home of 46-year-old Amy Moore in the early morning hours of May 29, police said.
He then confronted her and shot her “several times,” according to a Normal Police press release — before dying “from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.”
The incident has left the former couple’s three sons (aged 12, 11 and seven) without a mother, and the woman’s family is furious.
They have expressed anger over alleged mistakes leading up to the single mother’s death, which saw her allegedly harassed by her longtime husband.
Second-grade teacher Amy Moore — seen here with her three children — was found dead in an apparent murder-suicide in suburban Illinois last week
It happened after 64-year-old real estate agent Matthew Moore (seen here with his now orphaned children in 2022) illegally entered his longtime husband’s home in the early morning hours of May 29, police said.
“There were a lot of warning signs, a lot of phone calls, a lot of trips to lawyers to address this,” her elder Thomas said. WGLT last Sunday – before concluding: ‘I definitely think the whole system has failed her.’
“This is something that, given the number of incidents we’ve had over the years, should never have happened in the same room at the same time. That should have been impossible.’
The same channel reported the day after the murder that the couple – who appear to have married in 2013 – had divorced.
The newspaper reported how the divorce paperwork included protective orders filed by a teacher at Unit 5’s Grove Elementary against Matthew, who worked as a real estate agent for Berkshire Hathaway Home Services in Bloomington, according to his LinkedIn page.
They showed that the couple’s divorce was not clean and lasted almost two years.
Moreover, the latest filings to end the marriage occurred just a week before police said Matthew orphaned the couple’s three children and shot Amy.
Court documents go on to detail alleged stories of toxic behavior on the part of the patriarch, whose social media doesn’t show him enjoying a day out with his brood until 2022.
Some of the evidence was seen on social media and systematically documented by Amy, while others were left on a court-mandated app intended to expedite communication between the dueling parents.
One such message read: ‘Follow the case and you will know the truth. I don’t like starting fights, but I’ll never lose one. I must protect my children and myself from malicious attacks, even if it costs me and Amy $100,000 in attorney fees.”
He then confronted her and shot her “several times,” according to a Normal Police press release — before dying “from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.”
The divorce case was filed on July 28, 2022, after which the president addressed protective orders involving the parents on eleven separate occasions.
All were filed against Matthew and approved, with one even withdrawn after an agreement between the two parties.
The basis for the first order was an incident four days before divorce proceedings began, after which Amy – reportedly living paycheck to paycheck – consistently documented her husband’s actions.
It was alleged that Matthew got drunk during a family outing in Wisconsin and left, taking the family car with him.
This left her and the children having to rent a car to get home, the case files say – before revealing how the first emergency application for protection in the case came less than two weeks later.
It also cites two emails from early August last year that portrayed Amy as erratic – and which also left her concerned about her longtime husband’s stability.
“Petitioner alleges that Defendant has reverted to prior conduct of intimidation and discussing divorce matters with children,” the section reads, without providing more details.
The record does not indicate whether Amy had contact with police in Normal during these alleged incidents, and Normal Police Chief Steve Petrilli said Wednesday he was not aware of a pattern of abuse.
In the photo: the house where the apparent suicide took place. It remains unclear whether the children – aged 12, 11 and 7 – were home at the time of the incident
But the court docket details more alleged cases of harassment and protective orders.
This includes a 2022 misdemeanor arrest of Matthew for allegedly damaging Amy’s vehicle, an outburst that reportedly came after he arrived uninvited to the home where the murder would ultimately take place.
There, he took a series of unspecified items that he was supposed to keep away from, according to documents filed by Amy’s attorneys.
The documents also show the frequency of the protective orders, with one lengthy order lifted in August of that year, and another filed just six days later.
“Respondent has sent numerous boisterous, nonsensical and threatening messages to petitioner,” read one of these petitions, while others cited threatening social media posts from the suspected killer.
“See you in jail, you nasty woman,” read a Facebook post on the teacher’s profile.
Then, in another emergency warrant, Amy alleged that her ex stole money from her wallet while she was out of the house, and used an app to remotely change the house’s thermostat setting while she was home.
The father – seen in a photo with his children wearing a shirt touting his parenthood – is also said to have installed a doorbell with a camera in the house while she was away teaching and the children were at school.
The incident has left the former couple’s three sons (aged 12, 11 and 7) without a mother, and the woman’s family is furious.
They are angry over alleged mistakes made in the lead-up to the single mother’s death, which saw her allegedly harassed by her longtime husband, seen here
The victim also claimed that he put sex toys and condoms in the family’s Amazon account cart so they could be seen by the children, and that at one point Matt claimed in a message to have initiated a fraud investigation against her at a local Bank.
Despite all this, the record reflected that the two were still working toward some sort of reconciliation as recently as February of last year.
At one point, there was court-ordered mediation, after which Matthew’s erratic behavior continued, leading to more protective orders.
Finally, on May 20 this year – nine days before the alleged murder-suicide – the court suggested that the former couple had reached an agreement on financial and co-parenting matters surrounding the case.
On May 22, the final papers in the lengthy divorce were filed, and a week later, in the middle of the night, police say Matthew sneaked into the house to fatally shoot his wife.
Later that morning, officers investigated the scene as neighbors gathered in driveways, with the children nowhere to be seen. It is unclear whether they were home at the time of the incident.
After her death, Grove Elementary faculty remembered Amy as an “outstanding mother, daughter, educator and friend” after 19 years of dedicated service.
After her death, Grove Elementary faculty remembered Amy as an “outstanding mother, daughter, educator and friend” after twenty years of loyal service to the neighborhood school
After the incident, police were seen as neighbors gathered in driveways, with the children nowhere to be seen
“Amy, a graduate of Unit 5 Schools, was a gifted educator who impacted the lives of thousands of students,” Principal Sarah Edwards wrote in a statement.
“She was a beloved second-grade teacher at Grove Elementary for nearly 20 years and lived her life serving others, especially her three children.”
Her older brother added to WGLT that Amy “was essentially a single mother at the end of her life, working full time and living paycheck to paycheck,” after starting a business. GoFundMe to help with his now orphaned nephews.
As of this writing, the fundraiser has a goal of $400,000 intended for the Moore Boys, “to help fund their future,” he said.
“Please consider donating… Thank you for your love, support and prayers.”
An investigation into the incident is underway. Police said this week it was still being treated as a suicide.