Terri Moulton Horman, the Portland, Oregon stepmother who is facing police scrutiny in the case of missing seven-year-old Kyron Horman, has been accused of offering to pay a landscaper to off her husband Kaine Horman, the boy’s father. When police notified Kaine of the alleged plot, he moved out, obtaining a restraining order and filing for divorce.
Shortly after Kyron disappeared in early June, Terri Moulton Horman began to draw scrutiny, as she had been the last person to see Kyron alive at a science fair, for which the little boy had created a diorama about the red eyed tree frog. Kyron has been described as a sweet, well-behaved boy who would be unlikely to wander off.
Terri is a large, powerfully-built woman with the physical wherewithal to easily subdue an obedient little boy with poor vision. She has so far avoided arrest, but has been put under considerable police pressure. Given the landscaper’s allegations, she is beginning to look like a very credible suspect.
I must admit the focus on Terri Horman confused me a bit at first. What motive would a woman have to surreptitiously kill her stepchild, after all? If she did it in a fit of roid rage, that would be one thing, but it would take an uncommonly twisted individual to plan something like that. However, in chimp colonies, females have been known to kill their female rivals’ children, so perhaps hatred of the biological mother could provide sufficient motive.
