Washington sniper awaits his fate

Washington sniper John Muhammad was waiting today to hear if he would face the death penalty after being convicted of using a high-powered rifle, a battered car and a teenage sidekick to murder and terrorise people.

After yesterday’s verdict was announced, the Virginia Beach jury immediately began hearing evidence on whether the 42-year-old US Army veteran should get the death penalty or life in prison.

The penalty phase is expected to last several days.

“We reserve the death penalty for the worst of the worst,” prosecutor Richard Conway told the jurors.

”Folks, he still sits right in front of you without a shred of remorse.”

Muhammad stood brazen-faced as the verdict was read, looking straight ahead with the same enigmatic look he had throughout the trial. Two jurors held hands, and two others wept. Family members of victims held hands and wiped away tears.

Prosecutors presented evidence of 16 shootings, including 10 deaths, in Maryland, Virginia, Alabama, Louisiana and the District of Columbia that they said were part of a plot to extort £6.5 million from the government. Prosecutors say that during the sentencing phase, they also plan to present evidence of a killing in Washington state.

The jury deliberated for six and a half hours over two days before convicting Muhammad 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 Virginia law.

Muhammad was found guilty of killing Dean Meyers, a Vietnam veteran who was cut down by a single bullet that hit him in the head on October 9 last year as he filled up at a Manassas petrol station. He was also found guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and use of a firearm in a felony.

The victim’s brother Robert said he believed Muhammad deserved the death penalty: “I must say that I can’t think of too many more heinous crimes than this one,” he said.

Fellow suspect, Jamaican-born Lee Malvo, 18, is on trial separately in nearby Chesapeake for the killing of FBI analyst Linda Franklin at a shop in Falls Church. He could also face the death penalty.

Malvo’s lawyers are pursuing an insanity defence, arguing that the young man had been “indoctrinated” by Muhammad.

The men’s trials were moved some 200 miles to south-eastern Virginia out of concern that it would be too hard to find an impartial jury close to the nation’s capital because the sniper attacks had terrorised so many people.

The verdict came after three weeks of testimony in which a series of victims and other witnesses graphically – and often tearfully – recalled the horror that gripped the Washington area.

Jurors also saw several stomach-turning crime-scene photos, despite protests by the defence that the pictures were gratuitous.

Ten people were killed in the region and three were wounded in the spree, many of them shot as they went about their daily tasks: shopping at a craft store, buying groceries, mowing the lawn, going to school.

At the height of the killings, the area was so terrified that sports teams were forced to practise indoors, people kept their heads down as they pumped petrol, and teachers drew the blinds on their classroom windows.

The prosecution case included ballistics tests that connected the .223-calibre Bushmaster rifle found in Muhammad’s car to nearly all the shootings, testimony that his DNA was on the weapon, and a stolen laptop computer discovered in the blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice that contained maps of six shooting scenes, each marked with skull-and-crossbones icons.

Prosecutors presented no direct evidence that Muhammad pulled the trigger, but said it did not matter. They described Muhammad as the “captain” of a two-man ”killing team” and portrayed him as Malvo’s father figure, a stern and controlling man who trained the teenager to do his bidding.

The defence appeared focused on saving Muhammad from the death penalty, arguing that the evidence did not prove Muhammad directed the shootings or fired the gun in the Meyers killing.

In the penalty phase, prosecutors must prove one of two factors for the jury to recommend a death sentence: that Muhammad would present a future danger or that the crimes demonstrate “a depravity of mind”.

If the jury recommends a death sentence, the judge can reduce it to life without parole. If the jury recommends life, its decision is binding.

At the Malvo trial Monday, jurors heard testimony about the shooting of the FBI analyst. The judge ruled against allowing jurors to hear an emotional recording of the victim’s husband’s call to police.

Prosecutors put 17 witnesses on the stand yesterday. Roush said the defence would like to begin presenting its case on Friday, and prosecutors said they were on track to finish by then.

Defence lawyer Craig Cooley said Malvo had been told about Muhammad’s conviction, but the lawyer declined to comment on his client’s reaction.