Searchers comb woods for possible burial site of NC man missing since 2011

The searchers’ feet sunk into ankle-deep swamp water and sticker bushes grabbed at their hands as they pushed through the thick underbrush, looking for the tiniest sign of Daniel Moses.

They started at the end of a dead-end road, still in sight of their command post at an abandoned state prison, but the woods grew so dense they soon lost sight of each other standing 10 feet apart.

A piece of plastic here. An impression in the dirt there. Anything in these Northampton County woods might help find Moses — missing now for a dozen years.

“You never know what God’s going to bring to us today,” said Northampton Sheriff Jack Smith, addressing the crowd of 50 searchers. “You don’t ever know what you’re going to turn up till you look.”

This assembly of sheriff’s deputies, search and rescue teams, drone operators and five cadaver dogs represented the largest search yet for Moses, who vanished from the family home outside rural Rich Square in 2011.

For his sister Shelia Moses, it represented the fruit of more than a decade of persistence — a constant push for answers that borders on pestering. Twice on Tuesday, she told searchers she was 49 when her older brother went missing. Soon, she will turn 62.

“I’ve been waiting for the funeral twelve years,” she said. “I ask you to think of my mother today. She died not knowing what happened to Daniel.”

What happened to Daniel Moses?

Daniel Moses, a retired truck driver, had no known enemies and only one minor criminal offense. People knew him best as “The Barbecue Man” for the homemade chicken he delivered.

In 2011, his small wooden house caught fire and burned to a charred wreck, but not completely to the ground. Investigators found the 59-year-old man’s car parked in the yard and his barbecue tools out on the grill.

His air-conditioner had been running, and one day after the fire, his dog trotted home without him.

To his sister’s thinking, the case got soft-pedaled from the beginning, classified as a missing persons case and not a kidnapping or homicide. The State Bureau of Investigation did not join the missing person case until eight months later — only after she wrote to then-Gov. Beverly Perdue.

But though it sits a short drive from Interstate 95 at Roanoke Rapids, Northampton County is vast and empty. Its entire population numbers about 17,000 people, most of them spread out over flat farmlands interrupted by swamps and tall pines. Jackson, the county seat with a small brick courthouse, is home to only 420.

For about a decade, it seemed to Shelia Moses that everyone had given up the search but her. Three years ago, about eight searchers looked into an old well across from the family property, finding nothing.

Then last year, a tip from a witness who saw a leg poking out from the trunk of a car near Daniel Moses’ house, wearing the same kind of tube sock he liked to wear on his bike.

And on Tuesday, the searchers focused on a 60-acre tract near the old prison, acting on new information that he may have been buried there. Smith, the sheriff, issued this warning as they headed into the woods with sticks, machetes and garden clippers:

“I know some people who went turkey hunting and saw snakes,” he said. “They’re just coming out of the ground about now, and I don’t see many snake boots.”

North Carolina man has been missing since 2011. His sister demands answers and justice.

Searching 60 acres

Moses was a large man, taller than 6 feet and heavier than 200 pounds. He was skilled in martial arts. Whatever happened to him, it seemed unlikely to searchers that an assailant could have carried him very deep into a forest.

But if the briars and bramble that covered the ground were present in 2011, they had grown 12 years higher by Tuesday. Any advantageous patch of ground looked very different under the pine needles that have dropped since then, so they scratched the clear spots and dragged hoes over the pits they found, hoping to pull up something that didn’t belong.

By noon, the searchers hadn’t found anything. But they’d only covered about 20% of the 60 acres. So they headed out again after a lunch break, carrying full water bottles and a fresh blessing.

Because Moses is still out there, waiting to be found.