John Allen Muhammad (December 31, 1960 - November 10, 2009) was an American convicted murderer of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He, along with his colleague/gang Lee Boyd Malvo (age 17), Jamaican indigenous West Indies, carried out the October 2002 sniper attack on the Beltway, killing 17 people. Muhammad and Malvo were arrested in connection with the attack on October 24, 2002, following a tip from a cautious citizen. Although the actions of these pairs are classified by the media as psychopaths associated with the characteristics of serial killers, whether or not their psychopathy meets this classification or that a killer spree is disputed by the researchers.
Born as John Allen Williams , Muhammad joined the Nation of Islam in 1987 and then changed his family name to Muhammad.
At the trial of Muhammad, the prosecutor claimed that the rampage was part of a plot to kill his ex-wife and get custody of his children, but the judge ruled that there was not enough evidence to support this argument.
His trial for one of the murders (committed by Dean Harold Meyers in Prince William County, Virginia) began in October 2003, and the following month he was convicted of a major murder. Four months later he was sentenced to death. While awaiting execution in Virginia, in August 2005, he was extradited to Maryland to face multiple charges there. He was found guilty of six counts of first-degree murder on May 30, 2006. After completing a trial in Maryland, Mohammed was returned to the death penalty of Virginia pending approval with another state or District of Columbia seeking to prosecute him. He is not on trial for additional charges in other Virginia jurisdictions, and faces potential trials in three other states and the District of Columbia involving other killings and attempted murders. All calls of his conviction to kill Dean Harold Meyers have been made and rejected. The appeals to Muhammad's other trials were still pending at the time of execution.
Muhammad was sentenced to death on November 10, 2009, at 9 pm. EST at Greensville Center near Jarratt, Virginia, and was declared dead at 9:11 pm. EST. Muhammad refused to make the final statement.
Video John Allen Muhammad
Kehidupan awal
Born John Allen Williams in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for Ernest and Eva Williams, he and his family moved to New Orleans when his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer; he died when he was three years old. After the death of his mother, his father left. Williams was mainly raised by his grandfather and an aunt. In 1987 he joined the Nation of Islam, and in 2001, he changed his name.
As a member of the Nation of Islam, Muhammad helped provide security for "Million Man March" in 1995. Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan openly distanced himself and his organization from the evil of Muhammad.
Muhammad kidnapped his sons and took them to Antigua around 1999, apparently involved in credit card fraud and immigration documents. It was during this time that he became close to Lee Boyd Malvo, who later acted as his partner in murder. Williams changed his name to John Allen Muhammad in October 2001. After his arrest, authorities also claimed that Muhammad admitted that he admired and modeled after Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, and approved of the September 11 attacks. Malvo testified that Muhammad had indoctrinated him into believing that the result of extortion attempts would be used to establish "a camp in Canada where homeless children would be trained as terrorists."
Muhammad twice divorced; his second ex-wife, Mildred Muhammad, sought and was given an order of detention. Muhammad was arrested on federal charges of violating arrest warrants by possessing weapons. Under federal law, persons with arrest warrants are prohibited from buying or possessing weapons, in accordance with the Marine Amendment of the 1968 Arms Control Act.
The defense lawyer in the Malvo trial, and the prosecutor in the trial of Muhammad, argues that the ultimate goal of the Beltway sniper's murder is to kill Mildred to regain custody of his three children.
Maps John Allen Muhammad
Military services
In August 1978, Muhammad enrolled in the Louisiana Army National Guard in Baton Rouge as a combat engineer. Muhammad was transferred to the Regular Army on November 6, 1985 and Muhammad's first tour was with the 15th Engineer Battalion at Fort Lewis in 1985. In 1991, he served in the Gulf War with a company that broke down Iraq's chemical warfare rockets. In 1992, he was in Fort Ord, California, with 13 Engineers, and in 1993 back at Fort Lewis with Engineer Battalion 14.
While in the US Army, Mohammed was trained as a mechanic, truck driver, and specialist metal craftsman. He qualified with an Army standard rifle, M16, earned the Rifleman Expert Badge. This rating is the highest of the three base shotgun levels for a soldier.
Muhammad served in the engineer's unit during the 1991 Gulf War. Muhammad received the Southwest Asia Service Medal, the Kuwait Liberation Medal (Saudi Arabia), and the Kuwait Liberation Medal (Kuwait). He was honorably discharged from the Army on 24 April 1994 after 17 years working with the rank of Sergeant. For his service in the Army, Muhammad received the following awards: Army Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Foreign Band, Professional Development of Non-Armed Officials, and Achievement Medal of the Army.
Sniper beltway attack
The police followed the instructions in which Muhammad or Malvo left a note in one of the shootings to alert police to investigate the murder of a liquor store robbery that took place in Montgomery, Alabama. Researchers who responded to the crime scene found that one of the suspects had dropped a magazine with a fingerprint on it; was later identified as belonging to a 17-year-old Jamaican black immigrant, Lee Boyd Malvo, whose prints were stored in the INS. Malvo is known to be associated with Muhammad. They had lived together in Tacoma, Washington, for about a year, where Malvo used the alias John Lee Malvo.
Muhammad's identification led to the discovery that he had bought a used cop car, the blue Chevrolet Caprice, in New Jersey on September 11, 2002.
The public-lit spy on the vehicle made them arrested when the car was parked at the Interstate 70 stop in Myersville, Maryland.
Criminal Cases
On October 24, 2002, Muhammad was arrested in Maryland, where most of the attacks and murders took place. Although Maryland tried to take him to court, US attorney general John Ashcroft handed back the case from Maryland attorney Doug Gansler, a Democrat, to Virginia Republican prosecutor Jerry W. Kilgore. Kilgore plans to run for governor.
Virginia is seen as a more probable jurisdiction to impose the death penalty, which is borne by the Virginia and Maryland verdicts, and Virginia also allows the death penalty for teenagers.
In October 2003, Muhammad was put on trial for the murder of Dean Meyers at a Prince William County service office near the city of Manassas. The trial has been moved from Prince William County, to Virginia Beach, about 200 miles away. Muhammad was granted the right to represent himself in his defense, and refused his legal counsel, although he soon returned to have legal representation after his opening argument. He is accused of murder, terrorism, conspiracy and the use of illegal firearms, and faces possible death penalty. Prosecutors said the shooting was part of a plan to extort $ 10 million from local and state governments. Prosecutors said they would file a case of 16 shootings that allegedly involved Muhammad. The terrorism accusations against Muhammad demanded prosecutors to prove that he did at least two shootings in a three-year period.
The prosecution summoned more than 130 witnesses and introduced over 400 proofs intended to prove that Muhammad committed the murder and ordered Malvo to help carry it out. The evidence includes a rifle, found in Mohammed's car, which is associated with ballistic tests not only for 8 out of 10 murders in the Washington area but also for two others, in Louisiana and Alabama; the car itself, modified so that a sniper can fire from inside the trunk; and laptop computers, are also found in cars, which contain maps with icons that show scenes of shooting. The witness account placed Muhammad across the street from one shooting and his car near where several others were. There was also a recording of a phone call to the police hotline where a man, his voice identified by the detective as Muhammad, asked for money in exchange for stopping the shootings.
Muhammad's defense asked the court to cancel the murder charge because there was no direct evidence. Malvo's fingerprints were on a Bushmaster rifle found in Mohammed's car, and DNA from Muhammad was found on a rifle, but the defense held that Muhammad could not be put to death under Virginia's "human trigger law" unless he actually pulled the trigger to kill. Meyers, and no one testified that they saw him do it.
On November 17, 2003, based on his jury verdict, Muhammad was sentenced in Virginia to four counts in the indictment against him: the massacre of the shootings of Dean H. Meyers; a second charge of mass murder under Virginia's anti-terrorism laws, for murder committed with the intent to terrorize the government or the public at large; conspiracy to commit murder; and illegal use of firearms. In the trial sentence phase, the jury, after five hours of consideration for two days, unanimously recommends that Muhammad should be put to death. On March 9, 2004, a judge in Virginia agreed with the jury's recommendation and executed John Allen Muhammad.
On April 22, 2005, Virginia Supreme Court confirmed the death penalty, stating that Muhammad could be sentenced to death because the murder was part of an act of terrorism. The court also rejected an argument by defense lawyers that he could not be sentenced to death because he was not the trigger for the killings. Virginia Supreme Court Justice Donald W. Lemons said at the time, "With calculations, extensive planning, planned first and mercilessly to live, Muhammad runs his cruel terror scheme."
In May 2005, Maryland and Virginia reached an agreement to allow his extradition to face the charges of Maryland, but Muhammad fought legally. He is being held in the maximum Sussex I State Security Prison near Waverly, Sussex County, Virginia, which is a male death penalty in Virginia. While awaiting execution in Virginia, in August 2005, he was extradited to Montgomery County, Maryland to face charges there.
On May 30, 2006, a Maryland jury found John Allen Muhammad guilty of six counts of murder in Maryland. In return, he was sentenced to six consecutive lifetimes without the possibility of parole on June 1, 2006. Neither Alabama, Arizona, Louisiana, or Washington (state) moved to try Muhammad, recalling the death penalty for murder in Virginia. In 2006, Malvo acknowledged that the couple also killed 14 victims in California, Arizona, and Texas.
On May 6, 2008, it was revealed that Muhammad asked the prosecutor in a letter to help him end the legal appeal for his conviction and execution "so you can kill this innocent black man." The appeal filed by defense lawyer Muhammad in April 2008 cited evidence of brain damage that would make Muhammad incompetent to make legal decisions, and that he should not be allowed to represent himself in the Virginia trial.
On September 16, 2009, the date of Muhammad's execution was set for November 10, 2009.
On November 9, 2009, Muhammad's petition for review of the death penalty was rejected by the US Supreme Court.
Judge Stevens, joining Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor wrote a separate opinion stating that Virginia's rush to set an execution date highlighted once again the crimes of running prisoners before their appeals have been fully concluded, , while noting that they agree with the decision that the appeal should not be heard.
Civil case
In 2003, Malvo and Muhammad were named in a major civil lawsuit by the Brady Action Project to Prevent the Pistol Violence on behalf of two of their most severely injured victims and the families of some of those killed. Although Malvo and Muhammad are each believed to be poor, Bull's Eye Shooter Supply and Bushmaster Firearms, Inc. co-defendants contributed to a $ 2.5 million $ out-of-court settlement by the end of 2004.
Testimony of Lee Boyd Malvo
In the May 2009 trial of Muhammad in Montgomery County, Maryland, Lee Boyd Malvo, who was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole for his role in the shootings, took the stand and acknowledged it with a more detailed version of the couple's plans. Malvo, after extensive psychological counseling, admitted that he lied at a previous Virginia trial where he claimed to be the trigger for every shooting. Malvo claims he has done this to try to save Muhammad from a potential death sentence, because Malvo, a minor, will not face the death penalty. Within two days of his testimony, Malvo elaborated on the detailed aspects of all the shootings.
Part of his testimony relates to Muhammad's complete multiphase plan. The plan consists of three phases in the Washington metro area, D.C. and Baltimore. Phase One consists of careful planning, mapping, and practicing their location around the DC area. In this way after each shoot they will be able to quickly leave the area on a predetermined path, and move to the next location. Muhammad's goal in Phase One was to kill six whites a day for 30 days (180 per month). Malvo illustrates how Phase One does not go as planned because of heavy traffic and lack of clear shooting routes and/or holidays in different locations.
Stage Two is meant to be done in Baltimore. Malvo describes how this phase was almost applied, but it was never done. Stage Two will begin with the killing of a pregnant woman with a shot into the abdomen. The next step was to shoot and kill a Baltimore City police officer. Then, at the officer's funeral, they will blow up some improvised explosive devices complete with shrapnel. This explosive was intended to kill a large number of officers attending the funeral.
Phase Three will last very long after, if not during, Phase Two. That's to extort several million dollars from the United States government. This money will be used to finance a larger plan to travel north to Canada, stop at the YMCA and orphanage recruit youngsters that are easily influenced without parent or guidance. Muhammad thought he could act as their father figure as he did with Lee Boyd Malvo. Once he recruited a large number of young boys and has arrived in Canada, he will begin their training. Malvo illustrates how Muhammad allegedly intended to train young men with weapons. After their training is over, Muhammad will send them to the United States to do mass shootings in various cities, as he did in Washington, D.C. and Baltimore.
Execution
On September 16, 2009, Prince William Court Judge Mary Grace O'Brien set the date of the November 10, 2009 execution for Muhammad. On November 9, 2009, the United States Supreme Court rejected an appeal at the last minute. On November 10, several hours before Muhammad's execution schedule, the pardon appeal made by his lawyer was rejected by Virginia Governor Tim Kaine.
Under Virginia law, an inmate is allowed to choose the method by which he or she will be put to death, either a lethal injection or a power failure. As Muhammad refused to choose a method, by law, a lethal injection method was chosen for him. She was offered the last choice of food she received. J. Wyndal Gordon, Muhammad's lawyer, told the Associated Press that Muhammad's last meal consisted of "chicken and red sauce, and... some cakes".
Muhammad refused to make a final statement, and the execution began at 9:00 am. EST at Greensville Correctional Center, Greensville County, near Jarratt, Virginia. According to an official pronouncement of a prison spokesman, the actual deadly injection process begins at 9:06 am EST. He was later declared dead at 9:11 pm. EST.
His body was cremated and his ashes were given to his son in Louisiana.
In movie
Muhammad is portrayed by Bobby Hosea in the 2003 film D.C. Sniper: 23 Days of Fear , by Ken Foree in the 2010 movie D.C. Sniper , and by Isaiah Washington in the 2013 movie Blue Caprice .
See also
References
External links
- Angry Call Phone Provided One Essential Instruction, The New York Times , October 25, 2002 - explains the tracking and arrest of Muhammad
- Louis Farrakhan address sniper capture Press Conference Transcript, October 26, 2002
- CNN Special Report: Sniper Attacks, legal case at Wayback Machine (archived June 5, 2008)
- The Virginia indictment. v. Muhammad
- Change place of reservation: Virginia v. Muhammad
- NY Times-Prosecutors closed the case
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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