Moore Brothers

Joshua and Matthew Moore were a pair of killer brothers who abducted a number of teenagers aboard a school bus. They appeared in Season Eight of Criminal Minds.

Background
Joshua and Matthew both grew up playing violent video games and competing with each other. It appeared that Joshua usually kept winning against Matthew, leaving him embittered and determined to finally make a victory against his brother. Their constant gaming also reshaped their personalities, turning them hostile and dangerous. Sometime prior to "The Wheels on the Bus", their parents divorced and the two made a promise to look out for one another. One of their favorite video games to play was Gods of Combat, a first-person multiplayer shooter game. When they threatened other players, they were banned from playing the game. This led to their decision to create a real-life version of the game for them to play, using a large storage area to stage their 'game'.

The Wheels on the Bus
See sections on the Joshua Moore and Matthew Moore pages

Gods of Combat
Gods of Combat is a first-person multiplayer shooter game, in which two players competing against each other have their own five-soldier army consisting of a king, a queen, two warriors, and a pawn. There is a first level in which one player retrieves a key that can be used to unlock a box containing a gun. Meanwhile, the other player is able to retrieve his or her own gun from the box, but the gun is unloaded and the player must load it quickly before the other player's character arrives, essentially making the level a time race. The death of one of the players is decided through how fast they take their characters. On the front cover of the video game, there is a single character wearing a gas mask.

Modus Operandi
Joshua and Matthew targeted ten specific teenagers aboard the school bus, singling them out after determining their personalities via their accounts on social networking sites, personalities that they feel match the five soldiers from Gods of Combat. Using the ruse of a broken-down car, Joshua goaded the bus to stop, to which Matthew would then shoot the driver in the leg with a handgun once he opened the door. During the mass abduction, the two wore gas masks based on that from the Gods of Combat front cover, to ensure that the students they didn't target wouldn't see their faces. After disposing the teenagers' cell phones and tying them up, they took them to the barn, where they picked out the ten students before releasing the rest. They also killed the adults by shooting them.

After taking the remaining students to the storage area, Joshua and Matthew would then strap shock collars around their necks to discourage resistance and keep them in a large cage. After a while, the two would select one student each and have them play out the game, taunting them and making threats to ensure their cooperation. When Addyson Joneson shot and killed Trent Walker, she used a handgun retrieved from a box, as seen in the game's first level. Later, Joshua and Matthew would use assault rifles when things didn't go the way they planned.

Profile
Based on the unsubs' behavior, they suffer from an extreme gaming addiction. They are avid gamers, involved in the multi-user online first-person shooter game Gods of Combat. Like any addiction, this took over their lives and became an obsession. The video game aggravated a preexisting affinity for violence. Something blurred the lines between fantasized violence and violence in reality. They have managed to depersonalize their victims as a way of rationalizing the body count. Playing the game taught them to be methodical and dangerously strategic. The fact that they are mimicking specific and unique elements of the game will make their behavior predictable. The unsubs chose their victims specifically because they display certain traits that match the characters from the game. They are motivated and positive when the 'game' goes they way they want it to. But when it doesn't, they will become blinded with utter rage.

Mutual Victims

 * 26 people abducted aboard the school bus. They are:
 * A total of 24 students. They are:
 * Addyson Joneson
 * Sean Parker
 * Trent Walker
 * Billy Walton
 * Wendy Edwards
 * Sage Cooper
 * Shawn Duncan
 * Ashley Fletcher
 * Alice Kelly
 * Chad Ross
 * Fourteen other unnamed students
 * Roy Webster
 * Carol Roberts

Appearances

 * Season Eight
 * "The Wheels on the Bus"