Author Topic: Sniper Killer Trial about to Start (Read 195 times)

PLANT · « **on:** October 20, 2003, 05:15:23 AM »

Sniper killing trial arguments set Monday
Muhammad charged in shooting death at Virginia gas station
From Mike M. Ahlers
CNN Washington Bureau
Monday, October 20, 2003 Posted: 6:44 AM EDT (1044 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- One year after investigators first uttered the name John Allen Muhammad, prosecutors plan to spell out their case Monday against the older of the two suspects in 2002's Washington-area sniper killings.

Prosecutor James Willett will address 12 jurors and three alternates when opening statements in Muhammad's trial begin.

The jurors are Virginia Beach residents chosen partly because they said they had limited knowledge of the shootings that gripped the Washington region, a three-hour drive to the north. The jury was completed Friday in a process that took four days and started with 123 prospective jurors. (Full story)

Muhammad is charged with murder, terrorism, conspiracy and illegal use of a firearm in the killing of Dean Harold Meyers, an engineer who was shot October 9, 2002, while refueling his black Mazda at a Sunoco station in Manassas, Virginia.

Muhammad faces a possible death sentence if convicted on the murder or terrorism count.

After Willett's opening statement, attorney Peter Greenspun plans to speak to the jurors and may give the first real insight into the defense strategy.

Meyers, 53, was the seventh of 10 people killed during the October shootings. Three others survived gunshot wounds during the spree.

Prosecutors acknowledge that their case is circumstantial. They have neither a witness to the shooting nor a confession from Muhammad. But lawyers say a circumstantial case is not necessarily a weak case.

"Often it is much stronger than a case based on eyewitness testimony," said Henry Asbill, a prominent criminal defense attorney in Washington and frequent radio and TV commentator.

Many people, he said, have been placed on death row based on eyewitness testimony only to be freed later because of circumstantial DNA evidence.

Defense attorneys hinted at a defense when they asked prospective jurors last week whether they would consider mitigating circumstances if Muhammad is convicted, specifically mentioning a childhood of "abuse and neglect."

Muhammad, however, has not cooperated with what appears to be defense attorneys' strategy of showing he has mental health problems.

He has refused to be examined by defense psychiatric expert Park Dietz, against the advice of his lawyers.

Possible evidence
In a trial expected to last another five weeks, revelations and surprises are bound to come up.

But some of the evidence from the Meyers shooting has already become known in court filings, pretrial hearings, and a two-day preliminary hearing for Lee Boyd Malvo, the 18-year-old accused of conspiring with Muhammad in the shootings.

In the preliminary hearing, testimony focused on these areas:

• Ballistics. A Prince William County crime scene investigator testified that a medical examiner recovered 14 bullet fragments from Meyers' head. Walter A. Dandridge Jr. of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives testified that the splintered bullet was fired from the Bushmaster rifle found in Muhammad's car "to the exclusion of all other firearms."

• Fingerprints. FBI fingerprint specialist Mitchell Hollars testified that he found two fingerprints on the Bushmaster rifle, both of which belonged to Malvo. Muhammad's prints were not on the rifle.

• The car. David McGill, a forensic specialist with the Montgomery County, Maryland, police, described searching the 1990 Chevrolet Caprice after Muhammad and Malvo were arrested at a Maryland rest stop. He said the car's back seat was hinged so it would lift up. "In addition to that," he said, "while you would normally expect there to be a solid barrier between the trunk and the ... rear passenger area, that section of metal had been removed so that one could see directly through the entire trunk area from the back seat."

• Other items recovered from the car. McGill said they included a green duffel bag containing vitamins, personal items, a rifle scope, a Global Positioning System unit and a rifle magazine.

• The map. After the shooting, a map of Baltimore and Baltimore County, Maryland, was discovered in the parking lot of a Bob Evans restaurant across the street from the Sunoco station where Meyers was killed. The map contained both Muhammad's and Malvo's fingerprints, investigators testified.

Malvo may appear
One of the first people to be called into the Virginia courtroom may be Malvo. The younger suspect was brought to Virginia Beach on Sunday morning, sheriff's deputies there said.

His attorney, Michael Arif, said he is not sure why Malvo had been "invited" to appear. He theorized that prosecutors might want to use the younger man for identification purposes.

Officers from the Montgomery, Alabama, Police Department also have been summoned to testify, the police chief there said.

The chief said witnesses can place Muhammad and Malvo at the scene of a shooting September 21, 2002, at a Montgomery liquor store in which one woman was killed and a second was injured.

Asbill, a former District of Columbia public defender and past president of the American Board of Criminal Lawyers, said a conviction of Muhammad would not spell the end of the case.

"This case is going to be litigated, I think, long after this trial," Asbill said. "I'd be looking for any type of legal arguments that could be raised down the road that might forestall the inevitable sentencing if there is a guilty verdict in this case, because you never know when the Supreme Court might rule the death penalty unconstitutional.

"You never know when additional forensic evidence may come up that you are unaware of that might form the basis for some sort of collateral of post-conviction challenge."

CNN's Jeanne Meserve, Laura Bernardini and Jim Spellman contributed to this report.

UnstoppableForce · « **Reply #1 on:** October 20, 2003, 06:25:40 PM »

Hopefully the system will finally prove not to be corrupt, and let this poor man go so he can finally live his life without all this scandal the media is involving him in.

Trauma-san · « **Reply #2 on:** October 20, 2003, 08:33:45 PM »

I hope he gets the chair. I hope they forget to wet him down too, and fuck his shit up really painful, like he fucked up those poor innocent people. People like this need to get the Jeffrey Dahmer jail cell treatment. What kind of small-dick motherfucker goes around shooting people for fun, women shopping at Crafts stores and shit? I hope they rape him with a toilet plunger like Dahmer.

Trauma-san · « **Reply #3 on:** October 20, 2003, 08:36:07 PM »

Oh, and I just realized: This shows what we need liberals for. If there were no liberals in the world, there would be no stupid doe-eyed motherfuckers to actually try and get this guy off the hook, like his defense attorney. What kind of fucking slime defends somebody like this?

UnstoppableForce · « **Reply #4 on:** October 20, 2003, 08:38:15 PM »

Quote from: Buddy Holly on October 20, 2003, 08:36:07 PM

Oh, and I just realized: This shows what we need liberals for. If there were no liberals in the world, there would be no stupid doe-eyed motherfuckers to actually try and get this guy off the hook, like his defense attorney. What kind of fucking slime defends somebody like this?

It's America man; anything for money. You should know that by now; look at our foreign policy.