Here 𝓞 reads “those people were destroyed”. When he copied from 𝓞 into 𝓟, Oliver miscopied those as these, which all the printed editions have followed. The initial th of those was written at the end of the line in 𝓞, with the hyphenated -ose beginning the next line. Sometimes as Oliver copied the text into 𝓟, he would misread a word at the end of the line in 𝓞, as here. Of course, either reading, these or those, will work in this passage, so we follow the earliest reading. For a list of other places where Oliver mixed up those and these, see under Alma 3:25.
Summary: In accord with the reading of the original manuscript, restore those in Alma 37:29: “those people were destroyed on account of their wickedness and abominations and their murders”.