Left: Gregory Moore (Williamson County Jail). Right: Eliza Sherman (Justice for Eliza Sherman Facebook page).
Ohio authorities arrested a divorce attorney who they say murdered one of his clients because he did not want to go the case to trial.
Gregory Moore, now 51, allegedly chased down 53-year-old Aliza Sherman outside his downtown Cleveland law office in 2013 and stabbed her to death. The motive, the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office alleges, was because Moore wanted to incapacitate her so Sherman’s divorce case wouldn’t go to trial as scheduled.
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Moore on Friday was indicted for aggravated murder, conspiracy and kidnapping. According to the indictment, Sherman was set to meet Moore at his office around 4:30 p.m. on March 24, 2013, to discuss her case that was slated to go to trial the next day. The attorney told Sherman to call him once she was outside the office and he would let her in. But it was a meeting “Moore never intended to have,” prosecutors said.
According to authorities, the attorney was not prepared for her trial and he had a history of crafting ways to delay his court appearances. The year prior, Moore called in three separate bomb threats to courthouses where he was slated to appear. He would go on to plead guilty and serve a six-month jail sentence, according to the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
On the day in question, Sherman texted Moore shortly before 4:30 p.m. to let him know she had arrived at his office and would wait in her car until he got there. But unbeknownst to Sherman, Moore had turned off his phone so it couldn’t later be used by law enforcement to track him, cops said. The attorney allegedly used a company hotspot to text Sherman that he was “here.” Confused that he wasn’t letting her in, Sherman texted that she was going to walk back to her car because it was cold outside.
But prosecutors say either Moore or an “unknown conspirator” walked up to Sherman from behind, chased her down the street and stabbed her 10 times. In another effort to throw off investigators, Moore allegedly kept texting Sherman asking where she was, if she was going to meet with him and to call him.
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Sherman called police for help and a passerby also dialed 911 after seeing her lying on the sidewalk. She was rushed to a nearby hospital where she was pronounced dead.
As cops investigated at the scene, Moore entered his office building through a back entrance to avoid detection, per the indictment. He turned on his phone and continued to call Sherman as if he didn’t know about the assault, cops said. In the days following, Moore also switched cell phones. The divorce case was dismissed without ever having to go to trial. Her estranged husband died last year, per the Plain Dealer.
Investigators had long suspected Moore.
“This doesn’t surprise me,” Ed Tomba, the initial lead investigator for the Cleveland Police Department, told the Plain Dealer. “I had suspicions, but we didn’t have the evidence. When you deal with an aggravated murder charge, you have to be buttoned-up tight.”
Prosecutors did charge Moore for lying to cops about her death. He also pleaded guilty to that charge, along with the bomb threats.
Cops arrested Moore near Austin, Texas, on Friday. He will be arraigned once he’s brought back to Ohio.
“The Sherman family has waited over a decade for answers regarding their mother’s homicide,” Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley said in a statement. “Through the tenacious work of multiple law enforcement agencies, evidence was accumulated that paints the unmistakable picture that Gregory Moore orchestrated and participated in the brutal murder of Aliza Sherman.”
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations took over the case in 2021. Sherman’s murder also was featured on NBC’s Dateline.
Sherman, a mother of four, was a nurse at the Cleveland Clinic.
