Woman accused in slaying coveted luxurious lifestyle

She grew up in the backwoods of the Winter Strawberry Capital of the World, dreaming of things much finer than her parents' clunky cars and modest wood-frame house.

Dorice "Dee Dee" Moore liked nice clothes. She liked making money. So she worked hard to get luxuries she coveted, family members say.

But the bills mounted as she pursued a lavish lifestyle. When her $50,000 Lincoln Navigator was being repossessed in 2001, she stashed the car in Pasco County and told investigators three men carjacked her, raped her and left her in a ditch.

Earlier this month, Moore, 37, was arrested and accused of a more sinister crime: covering up the slaying of lottery winner Abraham Shakespeare after funneling more than $2 million of Shakespeare's cash and assets into her own accounts, according to investigators.

Friends and family say they don't know what happened to the girl and woman they knew. But there were clues.

Embarrassed by lack of money

Moore was born Dorice Donegan on July 25, 1972, at St. Joseph's Hospital. Her mother, Linda Donegan, said Moore was a gleeful child who became a Brownie, a Girl Scout and a cheerleader at her elementary school. At the time, the family lived on Happy Acres Lane in Riverview.

Moore also joined the Missionettes, a group of girls who held Bible studies, and attended church on Wednesdays and Sundays, Donegan said.

The Donegans moved to their rural home on Turkey Creek Road when Moore was 7. After she enrolled at Plant City High School, Moore became more aware of her humble upbringing, her mother said.

"When we would drop her off at her friends' houses, she would make us park a block away," Donegan said, smiling at the memory. "She was embarrassed by our cars. We didn't have much money."

Donegan, a certified nursing assistant, said her daughter was in high school when Moore followed in her footsteps. Moore received her certification as a nursing assistant on Aug. 12, 1991, records show. Her certification is still active.

As a nursing assistant, Moore was generous, giving people money and buying them food. She also lavished attention on developmentally disabled clients.

"She was so good to those people," her mother said.

Around this time, Donegan said, her daughter started dating James Moore, who lived a few miles away on South Forbes Road. The two married on May 1, 1992, in Plant City. The couple divorced last June.

Donegan won't say much about James Moore, only that once her daughter married him, the family didn't see much of her.

James Moore could not be reached for comment. His mother, Frances Moore, said the family is still in shock over Dee Dee Moore's arrest.

"She was in our family for 16 years," Frances Moore said. "Our family is upside down. It is mind-boggling."

Plotting to save her SUV

Dee Dee Moore first became acquainted with jails and the court system 11 years ago.

In 1999, she was arrested in Polk County for shoplifting; adjudication was withheld in the case.

In 2001, Moore was arrested for writing a worthless check to the Hillsborough County Tax Collector's Office for $418.60. She was sentenced to 12 months probation, paid $498.60 in restitution and $100 in court costs, records show.

In June of that year her crimes grew more elaborate. So did her lies.

Moore told investigators she was carjacked on June 20, 2001, by three men outside of an eastern Hillsborough post office, court records show. She told detectives the men forced her at gunpoint into her black Lincoln Navigator, kidnapped her, and bound her with electrical tape.

Moore told detectives the men raped her and left her in a ditch near Ft. Lonesome, about 20 miles south of Plant City.

She staged the entire incident, Hillsborough sheriff's detectives said, because her luxury sport utility vehicle was getting repossessed.

"You're not taking my car," Moore told a credit union representative six days before the fake carjacking. "I'll do anything I have to to keep it."

At the time, Moore owed about $6,500 in credit card debts and car payments, along with $9,800 on the lease of a house she was renting in Dover, records show. She had a business selling prepaid Nextel cell phones but was the subject of a company fraud investigation.

As Moore spoke to investigators, she gave vivid accounts of how she was carjacked and the description of her attackers, down to their clean-cut faces and blue-green tattoos.

When detectives pushed her about the rape, Moore said, "If I describe that I'm gonna start crying and throwing up again," according to an audio interview with investigators.

But she talked about it anyway.

"So anyways, they had ... uh ... ummmm ... sex with me," Moore said. "And it hurt."

Moore submitted to a rape exam. Results of a lie-detector test were inconclusive.

Within days, Moore's story unraveled. She was sentenced to one year of probation and ordered to perform community service, and pay restitution and court costs.

A financial adviser

In 2004, Moore created American Medical Professionals, a nursing staffing agency. Her mother said she was making good money, at one point earning about $200,000 before meeting Shakespeare.

Moore became a part of Shakespeare's life in 2007, when she told him she wanted to write a book about him, investigators said. She eventually became something of a financial adviser to Shakespeare, who won an estimated $30 million Florida Lottery jackpot in late 2006.

Shakespeare, 43, was killed between April 6 and 7. Before his family reported him missing in November, Moore lied about Shakespeare's whereabouts for eight months, investigators said.

Moore spent a lot of time with Shakespeare's mother, Elizabeth Walker, after Shakespeare went missing, taking her out to restaurants and theme parks, Donegan said.

"It makes me sick," Donegan said. "She took that woman around knowing her son was dead. Maybe Dee Dee felt guilty."

Killers threatened son, she says

Shakespeare's body was found last month under 5 feet of dirt and 4 inches of concrete at 5802 State Road 60 near Plant City, on property owned by Moore and her boyfriend. He had been missing since April.

Donegan said her family is devastated. Moore's 15-year-old son, R.J., is reeling over his mother's arrest, Donegan said.

Donegan recently took R.J. to Orient Road Jail, where Moore is being held on $1 million bail after she was booked Feb. 2 on a charge of accessory after the fact to first-degree murder.

During the visit, Moore told her son and mother that she didn't kill Shakespeare, Donegan said. Moore said she covered up the slaying because the real killers are threatening her son. Moore told her mother that if law enforcement agrees to protect R.J., she will tell investigators who killed Shakespeare.

"That's what she told me," Donegan said. "I don't know what to believe."

Standing on the lawn of her modest house on Turkey Creek Road - the same house that Moore would become embarrassed about as a teen - Donegan wondered how her daughter got into this mess.

"I don't know what happened to Dee Dee," Donegan said. "She was a wonderful child."