Washington sniper faces death

John Allen Muhammad faces the death penalty after a jury today decided he was one of the Washington area snipers.

The jury in a suburb of the US capital convicted Muhammad of capital murder, concluding he used a rifle, a beat-up car and a teenager who idolised him to kill randomly and terrorise the area during last autumn’s sniper spree.

Jurors will now decide whether the former soldier should be sentenced to death or life in prison.

Muhammad was convicted of two counts of capital murder. One accused him of taking part in multiple murders, the other – the result of a post-September 11 terrorism law – alleged the killings were designed to terrorise the population.

Muhammad is the first person tried under the law.

Muhammad, 42, was found guilty of killing Dean Harold Meyers, a Vietnam veteran who was cut down by a single bullet that hit him in the head as filled his car at a petrol station.

Fellow suspect Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, is on trial separately in nearby Chesapeake for the killing of Linda Franklin outside a shop. He also could get the death penalty.

In all, the two men were accused of shooting 19 people – killing 13 and wounding six – in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia.