Lexington Co. deputies arrest man accused of West Columbia shooting

Patrick David Esparza was identified by detectives as a person of interest in the shooting death of Charles Boyd Moore Jr, say deputies. (Photo: Lexington Co. Sheriff’s Dept.)

LEXINGTON COUNTY, S.C. (WOLO)–  Lexington County deputies have arrested a man accused of shooting a man to death last week in West Columbia, says the sheriff’s dept.

Patrick David Esparza was identified by detectives as a person of interest in the shooting death of Charles Boyd Moore Jr.

Investigators say Esparza was a person of interest in Moore’s death because the two had been seen together just hours before Moore was shot to death at a home on Hammond Avenue.

Esparza allegedly left the scene and went to a home on Grove Street where he hid the gun investigators believe he used in the shooting, according to Lexington County Sheriff Jay Koon.

“This was a crime that involved multiple locations, some of them within the city of West Columbia. We’re grateful to the West Columbia Police Department for working with us in the early phases of this investigation,” Sheriff Koon says.

Deputies arrested Esparza Friday on a weapons charge unrelated to Moore’s shooting death.

He is being charged with murder in the March 20 shooting death of Charles Boyd Moore Jr.

And he remains in the Lexington County Detention Center after a judge denied him bond Tuesday afternoon, March 24.