DC sniper to be executed Nov. 10

Posted on October 08, 2009 by Spencer Pyke

In an initial 14 hours, five people were shot and killed. Three weeks later, 10 were dead and three more were injured.

"The anonymous gunman moved covertly from city to suburb, picking his victims at random: a man in the parking lot of a Wheaton grocery store, a woman outside a Silver Spring post office, an elderly man on the streets of Washington, a Bowie schoolboy," according to an article on washintonpost.com

Sept. 29, Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine continued his support of the court ruling to execute John Allen Muhammad on Nov. 10. Muhammad was the mastermind behind the Washington, D.C.  area sniper shootings.

Juries found Muhammad guilty in 10 deaths in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. from the October 2002 shootings, according to cbsnews.com. Lee Boyd Malvo, Muhammad's accomplice, was a teenager when the events took place and is serving life in prison. 

"I know of nothing in this case now that would suggest that there is any credible claim of innocence or that there was anything procedurally wrong with the prosecution," Kaine said on his monthly WTOP call-in radio show.

Muhammad and his defense team have claimed that prosecutors withheld evidence in previous hearings.  The defense team is also trying to prove that Muhammad was mentally impaired when he questioned 18 witnesses in August in front of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals before handing the trial over to his court appointed attorneys.  

"Muhammad attorney Jon Sheldon said there were ‘huge procedural errors in the case' that he plans to raise in the clemency petition he expects to file mid-October, and other issues he'll raise in a motion with the U.S. Supreme Court in early November," according to the Associated Press

Lynchburg College senior Britni Sockel is from Bethesda, Md. in Montgomery County where some of the shootings took place. Sockel is pro capital punishment and said she agrees that Muhammad should receive the death penalty.

"He should be executed," Sockel said. "He took the lives of many innocent people."

Mike Jewel, a sophomore from Fairfax, Va., said that he has been to multiple of the gas stations where the shootings took place and said he fully backs the decision to execute Muhammad.

"The whole situation was crazy back when it happened," Jewel said. "My homecoming that year in high school was cancelled and everyone felt like they had to watch over their shoulder whenever stepping outside."

Kaine, a Roman Catholic, has said he is opposed to the death penalty but has allowed nine executions and commuted one sentence since he took office in 2006. Virginia has the nation's second highest execution rate behind Texas, according to the nytimes.com.