A paedophile drag queen had sex with two male strangers and a dog before suddenly dying in an alleyway in Wales, an inquest into his death has heard.
Darren Meah-Moore, 39, was found in full costume, blonde wig and make-up under two flattened cardboard boxes in Cardiff’s city centre in January 2023, and the city shut down public streets to give him a funeral possession even though he was convicted of child rape.
Meah-Moore, who performed under the names Crystal Couture, Dolly Diamond and CC Quinn and featured on American TV series RuPaul’s Drag Race, was described as being “at the heart of Cardiff’s gay community” after his death.
A five-day inquest at Pontypridd Coroner’s Court this week found that Meah-Moore had sex with at least two men and was penetrated by a dog before collapsing, but Coroner David Regan returned an open conclusion about the sudden death, WalesOnline reported.
The dog owner, who was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter but released and has not been named, told the inquest he met Meah-Moore in a secluded carpark and claimed his dog spontaneously had sex with the drag queen, who then fell asleep. The man claimed he then covered Meah-Moore with the cardboard to keep him warm.
Mr Regan rejected this account, and said there was no evidence proving whether Meah-Moore, who had a dog allergy, facilitated the sexual intercourse with the dog or not.
Tests found human and non-human semen DNA matched to the dog inside Meah-Moore’s body, but the coroner found there was no evidence the death was caused by an allergic reaction.
“The deceased and the man encountered each other without pre-arrangement in Queen Street, Cardiff, at 5.49am on the morning of Sunday, January 22,” Mr Regan said.
“Prior to that time, the deceased had had at least one other sexual encounter that night, and had joked about intending to perform oral sex on a male. The deceased followed a man, accompanied by his dog, into Park Lane in Cardiff.
“Darren and the male walked down Park Lane and walked together toward a blind alley at Valentino’s car park, out of view of a camera. There is no evidence either were acting in anything other than a voluntary manner at that time. They remained out of view for 30 minutes.
“The man then returned to view without his dog and returned to view eight minutes later, before returning to the alleyway with cardboard. Darren never emerged from the alleyway. At some stage between 5.52am and 6.38am, the man’s dog penetrated Darren. Between 6.33am and 6.38am, the man covered Darren with cardboard.
“I don’t accept that Darren was covered in cardboard by the man to keep him warm. On the evidence, he placed two sheets over him, and couldn’t reasonably have expected this to provide any warmth, however I am unable to determine that Darren was covered for any nefarious reason.
“I don’t accept the man’s account that the dog penetrated Darren spontaneously without human act causing this to happen. I am unable to determine how this happened, however. Due to the absence of evidence, I am unable to determine whether the deceased sought sexual contact with a dog, equally there is no evidence he did not.”
He also told the court doctors did not rule out “fatal arrhythmia from an unknown cause”, but there was no evidence trauma or natural disease caused his death, and that there was no medical literature showing fatal anaphylaxis as a result of contact with a dog.
Mr Regan said the cause of death was a result of “sudden death in a man with bronchial asthma in the cold who had consumed alcohol and in a temporal association with sexual activity including intercourse with a dog”.
“Darren had been socialising during the previous night in a number of city centre locations, and had had sexual contact with at least two males. It is likely he came to be in a collapsed state between 5.52am and 6.33am that morning following penetration by a dog whilst in the company of its owner. It is not known what caused him to be in a collapsed state,” he said.
Nightclub manager Sean Rogers found Meah-Moore’s body after going out to look for him after he was reported missing, and South Wales Police said at the time the deceased was “dressed in drag and was wearing full face make-up, a luminous green dress, a blonde wig, diamante heels and a matching clutch bag”.
Meah-Moore was jailed for three years after being convicted of four counts of raping a boy under 16, and breached his sex offender’s order in 2011 by working as a dance tutor for children, resulting in him being given a three-year community order.
Despite his paedophilia convictions Cardiff Council and South Wales Police shut down three busy city centre roads for his funeral procession, which was funded with the help of the founder of Drag Queen Story Hour UK, but there was only a small turnout, ITV reported at the time.
Header image: Left, right, Darren Meah-Moore (supplied).
