John Jefferson
Left inset: Brittani Harmon Moore (Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office). Right: Law enforcement responds to home on cul-de-sac where Moore’s sister was shot to death (WRCB).
Investigators in Chattanooga, Tennessee, allege that a 27-year-old shot her younger sister in the back of the head and left her dead on a couch at home before the suspect took a Lyft to a Publix supermarket, called 911, and tried to pin the crime on another woman.
The Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office investigation began after lunch on Thursday when a woman called 911 from Publix and purported to confess committing to a murder at a home located on a cul-de-sac at the end of Thrush Hollow Lane. That caller allegedly tried to pass herself off as the pregnant girlfriend of Moore’s husband, local NBC affiliate WRCB reported.
That apparently didn’t work, as the suspect named by authorities as Brittni Moore (Harmon) but listed in jail and court records under the name Brittani Nicole Harmon, is now charged with murder.
After the 911 call, the victim, identified in some places as 25-year-old Brianna Harmon and in others as Breanna, was found fatally shot on a couch at home. The defendant reportedly claimed she was asleep on the couch with the victim before seeing her sister get up to use her phone that morning. In other words, the suspect allegedly claimed that before she went to Publix her sister she was still alive at home.
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At the start, the sheriff’s office only said it was “conducting a death investigation” and that there was “no” broader “threat to the community, since a suspect was already detained.
In an update, deputies identified their suspect and called the shooting an “isolated incident.”
WRCB shed more light on how authorities came to conclusions about the identity of the shooter and the nature of the crime.
Moore was allegedly caught on a neighbor’s Ring camera at the crime scene when the shooting unfolded and caught on Publix surveillance video. While Moore allegedly claimed to be her husband’s pregnant girlfriend and claimed to be calling from a Fast Access Healthcare clinic, the Publix video combined with GPS evidence tracing the call to the store undermined that story, the report said.
Hamilton County General Sessions Court records reviewed by Law&Crime show that Moore is expected in court at 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 21.
Court records also show that Moore has faced several other cases, from 2017, 2018, 2020, 2022, and at the start of 2024 — whether for theft, aggravated arson, improper use of 911 or making false reports.
Now she faces her most serious allegation of all: first-degree murder, a crime punishable upon conviction in Tennessee by death or life in prison with or without parole. It’s not immediately clear if the accused has a defense lawyer.
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