DELAWARE, Ohio — She was seated as juror no. 8 in the Matheau Moore murder trial. The Westerville man was charged with killing his wife, Emily Noble, and staging her death to look like a suicide. Noble was reported missing in May 2020. Her body was found later that September in a wooded area near her home.
“I knew from day one I thought he was not guilty, and the prosecutors never changed my mind,” said Connie, who asked that her last name not be revealed. “I didn’t falter on how I felt, not for one minute.”
She said the first piece of evidence to convince her came during the first day of testimony. It was the body camera footage of Moore’s first encounter with Westerville police when an officer responded to his 911 call reporting his wife missing.
Connie said, on the video, Moore seemed cooperative and helpful and acted distraught about his wife’s disappearance. She felt he was not “putting on a show” and truly wanted to help.
“That was the beginning of it,” she said. “I thought this guy, I’m thinking not guilty. But I went in open-minded, hoping the prosecuting team would prove me wrong, show me something here, give me something. They didn’t have it. They had nothing.”
Moore said she was not convinced by Moore’s interview with detectives, which showed him referencing his wife in the past tense and mentioning suicide several times. She was not convinced by Dr. Bill Smock, who testified that Noble’s neck injuries could not have been caused by suicide and had to be murder. She was not convinced by the couple’s text message and testimony from friends showing the couple’s marriage was in trouble. Nothing could convince her that Moore was guilty.
“I just will never believe he killed his wife,” she said. “Is it possible that someone else did? Absolutely. And then I think, maybe she did commit suicide. She’s had a lot of sadness in her life. And I feel for Emily, too. She certainly deserves justice. Her family certainly deserves to put her to rest.”
Connie does not believe a random stranger could have killed Noble. But she does believe someone else close to Noble could have.
All she does know for sure is that she feels confident in the jury’s decision. She said, almost from the get-go, every juror was ready to find Moore not guilty. She said not a single juror ever was pushing for a guilty verdict.
“I’ll go to my grave knowing I made the right decision,” she said. “And I will always think of Matt Moore and hope he’s got a bright future and is happy and can move on from this because it changed his life, financially, mentally, everything, you know. I hope he opens a door of opportunity and can be happy again.”