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Sniper md gives va { November 8 2002 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25623-2002Nov7.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25623-2002Nov7.html
Sniper Suspects Handed to Va. for Trials
State's Death Penalty Cases Cited
By Susan Schmidt and Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, November 8, 2002; Page A01
The Justice Department turned over sniper suspects John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo to Virginia authorities yesterday to face separate murder trials -- Muhammad in Prince William County and Malvo in Fairfax County.
U.S. Attorney General John D. Ashcroft announced the much-anticipated decision at a dramatic news conference in which he invoked the names of the 10 people killed in last month's sniper shootings in the D.C. area. He said he made the determination based on which jurisdictions had "the best law, the best facts and the best range of available penalties."
Ashcroft and the Virginia prosecutors mentioned the state's experience in death penalty cases several times at the news conference and said Muhammad and Malvo deserved execution if they are convicted in the sniper shootings.
Yesterday's announcement came after police in Atlanta said they had linked Muhammad, 41, and Malvo, 17, to the shooting death of a liquor store clerk there. In all, the pair is suspected in 21 shootings in Maryland, Virginia, the District, Washington state, Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana that killed 14 people.
In granting the case to Virginia prosecutors, the federal government dropped its own charges against the suspects. Malvo still is classified as a juvenile and would have to be waived to adult court by a judge -- a process that could take weeks -- meaning Muhammad probably would be tried first. He faces capital murder charges in the Oct. 9 shooting death of Dean Harold Meyers, 53, at a gas station outside Manassas. Malvo faces the same charges in the Oct. 14 slaying of FBI analyst Linda Franklin, 47, outside a Home Depot.
Ashcroft did not say why the two suspects were being sent to different courts or give any account of the evidence against them that might have prompted his decision.
After the Justice Department transferred custody to Virginia, Muhammad and Malvo were taken to the Alexandria jail. Two of Prince William's most experienced detectives picked up Muhammad there and drove him to the jail in Manassas, where more investigators and prosecutors were waiting, hoping he might make voluntary statements. Although Muhammad was represented by a federal public defender, his transfer to Virginia and the dropping of federal charges opened him up again to police interrogation. Sources said that as of late last night, Muhammad had not invoked his right to an attorney but had not given investigators significant information.
Muhammad's federal public defender in Maryland, James Wyda, said yesterday that he believes the decision to transfer his client to Virginia was made because the government wants to swiftly execute him. "It seems to be that the attorney general decided to allow the rate of execution to determine where justice will be sought in this case," Wyda said. "The government's clumsy, macabre forum shuffle for the cheapest and easiest way to obtain the death penalty against my client diminishes the system of justice."
Ashcroft chose the state's most experienced prosecutors with his decision. Robert F. Horan Jr. has been Fairfax's chief prosecutor since 1967, and Paul B. Ebert has served in Prince William since 1968. Each has handled several high-profile capital cases.
Horan and Ebert, who appeared with Ashcroft and 12 other local and state officials at the news conference, said they expected the cases to move quickly. Ebert, who has won more death penalty convictions than any prosecutor in the state, called Muhammad and Malvo "the worst of the worst."
Montgomery County Police Chief Charles A. Moose and County Executive Douglas M. Duncan (D), whose county experienced six of the 10 area killings, said they supported Ashcroft's decision to send the first cases to Virginia, which has executed more killers than any state besides Texas. There currently is a moratorium on the death penalty in Maryland, and state law could make bringing a capital case there difficult. In addition, Malvo, as a juvenile, is not eligible for the death penalty in Maryland or the federal courts.
"The public wants swift and certain justice here, and that's what's going to happen," Duncan said after the announcement.
Moose, who led the massive multi-jurisdictional sniper investigation, said Justice Department lawyers had carefully weighed the evidence and the law in making the decision. "I trust the people that deliberated, and I trust the attorney general, and I support it 100 percent," he said.
Absent yesterday was Montgomery County State's Attorney Douglas F. Gansler, who was the first to charge the suspects and has argued that his office should go first in trying them because so many of the killings took place in Montgomery. Gansler watched Ashcroft's announcement on a television in his office in Rockville but declined to comment after issuing a statement.
"As I have said all along, the most important objective in all of these prosecutions is that justice be done and that these two men be held accountable for the crimes that they allegedly committed," Gansler said. "I intend to do everything that I can to assure that this objective is achieved for each and every jurisdiction that prosecutes these men."
Gansler's spokesman, John McLane, said Justice officials had not consulted them since Gansler filed state charges Oct. 25.
Also absent was D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey, who said he is frustrated that the U.S. attorney's office in the District has not filed charges there.
Malvo, who arrived at the Fairfax jail in midafternoon, is scheduled to appear today before Fairfax County Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court Chief Judge Charles J. Maxfield. Horan said an attorney would be appointed at today's hearing. Detectives also were questioning him into last evening, sources said. Joshua R. Treem, a Baltimore lawyer who represented Malvo for closed-door appearances in federal court in Maryland, declined to comment.
Muhammad is scheduled to appear in Prince William County before Chief Circuit Court Judge Herman A. Whisenant Jr. Muhammad does not yet have a lawyer appointed to represent him in Prince William, but that could happen today.
The two suspects face charges under Virginia's new anti-terrorism law that covers violence intended to intimidate the public or influence the government. The statute, which went into effect in July in response to the Sept. 11 attacks, does not require prosecutors to prove who pulled the trigger.
They also face capital charges under a more traditional provision of Virginia law that makes a killer eligible for the death penalty if he kills more than once in a period of three years.
Ebert, who has sent a dozen people to death row, said it probably won't be difficult to establish that Muhammad was involved in more than one homicide. He could use evidence from any of the killings in which Muhammad is a suspect, regardless of whether there is a conviction, he said. But to use that provision, Ebert would have to prove that Muhammad fired the shot that killed Meyers. He declined to say whether he has that evidence, but sources said that was still unclear.
The anti-terrorism law -- which hasn't been tested -- would require prosecutors to show only that Muhammad and Malvo were part of a terroristic act. That wouldn't require Ebert or Horan to show who pulled the trigger or when, just that they were working together to terrorize society.
Sources close to the investigation said police believe that they have found the spot where the shot was fired that killed Meyers as he pumped gas, and there is some evidence that a car matching Muhammad's was seen in the vicinity of the shooting.
Police and prosecutors are also waiting to review surveillance videotape to look for the car.
Investigators believe that Muhammad and Malvo backed their car up to the edge of a parking lot adjacent to a Bob Evans restaurant across Route 234 from the Battlefield Sunoco gas station. That vantage point would have put a shooter at the top of a slight grassy hill, taking a downward shot that would have been at least 200 to 300 yards.
Police sealed that area off moments after the shooting and kept it closed for more than 12 hours while they searched for evidence.
Sources also said that Prince William authorities recovered an item with palm prints that they believe was left by the suspects, but detectives haven't been able to compare the prints to those of Muhammad and Malvo. Sources said authorities have traced the item to Maryland near where other shootings occurred.
Ebert is known for his tough, direct approach with juries. He often wins them over with his down-home demeanor.
His assistants cringe when he asks jurors to set defendants free if they don't think he proved his case. "If you don't think he did the crime," Ebert says during almost all of his closing arguments, a finger pointed at the defendant, "acquit him."
No Prince William jury has ever acquitted a capital murder defendant in an Ebert case.
Horan also has handled a number of capital cases, including the prosecution of Mir Aimal Kasi, who is scheduled to be executed next week for shootings outside CIA headquarters that killed two people and wounded three others in 1993. Loudoun County Commonwealth's Attorney Robert D. Anderson said prosecutors across Virginia turn to Horan for guidance on legal issues. "When he talks, people listen," Anderson said.
Authorities in Fairfax believe the shooter at the Home Depot store fired from the last row of cars in the store's parking garage, near eastbound Route 50.
Law enforcement officials said they probably would work together with all the jurisdictions where a shooting occurred to prepare for trial.
One jurisdiction -- the District -- has not yet brought charges. Yesterday, Ramsey said he skipped the news conference because he is frustrated that hasn't happened yet in the fatal shooting of Pascal Charlot, 72, a case that has been linked to the snipers.
"He may be one victim," Ramsey said. "But he's one that counts. And someone has to speak up for the man and for his family."
While the District waits, Prince William and Fairfax prosecutors said they would forge ahead and seek execution. "If anyone deserves the death penalty, Mr. Muhammad does," said Prince William Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney James A. Willett, who has successfully prosecuted six death penalty cases, "simply [because of] the number of people who were hurt for no better reason than they went to a store or were pumping gas; because of the coldblooded, calculating, cowardly executions from a distance and anonymously; because parents throughout the region had to worry about the safety of their children, and because young kids had to learn the word 'sniper.' It was all terrible."
Staff writers Justin Blum, Patricia Davis, Dan Eggen, Maria Glod, Sari Horwitz, Allan Lengel, Katherine Shaver, Jamie Stockwell and Eric Weiss contributed to this report.
© 2002 The Washington Post Company
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