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Rifle from tacoma Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20021028/ts_nm/crime_shootings_gun_dc_1http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20021028/ts_nm/crime_shootings_gun_dc_1
Sniper Rifle Link Sought at Tacoma Gun Shop
Mon Oct 28, 6:24 PM ET
TACOMA, Wash. (Reuters) - Federal agents were scouring records at a Tacoma, Washington gun shop on Monday for clues on how suspected serial sniper John Allen Muhammad got his hands on a rifle delivered to the store in June.
Agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms have yet to find sales records from Bull's Eye Shooter Supply for the weapon linked to 13 shootings in and around Washington, D.C., despite several days of searching, local media have reported.
Bull's Eye owner Brian Borgelt told the Tacoma News Tribune there was a "very good chance" Muhammad bought the rifle from his store, which ATF agents first visited last Thursday, a day after Muhammad's arrest in Maryland.
Borgelt did not return a phone call seeking comment on Monday, but a store employee acknowledged a "routine audit" of the store's sales records was underway.
An ATF spokeswoman did not return repeated calls for comment. An FBI (news - web sites) spokeswoman referred calls to the ATF.
A restraining order filed by Muhammad's ex-wife legally barred him from owning a gun, and a legally required background check would have warned the gunshop not to sell him a weapon.
Various law enforcement agencies continue to compile evidence against Muhammad, a 41-year-old Gulf War (news - web sites) Army veteran, and Lee Boyd Malvo, 17, a Jamaican illegal immigrant whom Muhammad called his stepson.
Muhammad had bought a similar rifle in December 1999 from Welchers Gun Shop in Tacoma, about 30 miles south of Seattle, and sold it back to the shop in May 2000. The gun was later sold to another customer, a store employee said.
POSSIBLE MOTIVE
Muhammad's former brother-in-law, Charlie Green, a truck driver who lived with Muhammad's family for three years in Tacoma, said he thinks the shooting spree was meant to cover up the planned murders of his ex-wife Mildred and their children.
"He was getting ready to take out my sister and the kids," Green, who now resides in Providence, Rhode Island told the News Tribune during a recent layover in Tacoma.
Muhammad, previously known as John Allen Williams, is also being investigated to see if he has ties to other murders in Washington state. Tacoma police last week re-opened a probe in the unsolved murder eight months ago of a woman whose aunt had sided with Mildred as she sought to divorce Muhammad and gain custody of their three children.
On Feb. 16, 21-year-old Keenya Cook opened the door to her aunt's home and was killed by a single shot from a handgun fired at close range, according to Tacoma police. Muhammad had been arrested for shoplifting in Tacoma just four days earlier, suggesting he was in the area on the day of the shooting.
Cook's aunt, Isa Nichols, had handled accounting work for Muhammad when he opened an auto repair business out of his home in 1995. Mildred filed to divorce Muhammad in 1999 and accused him of threatening to kill her months later. In March 2000, he reportedly abducted the children, disappearing for 18 months.
In the Seattle suburb of Renton, Washington, police were also checking for a possible Muhammad link to a murder of a 49-year-old nurse shot with a handgun on the sidewalk next to her car in July.
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