John Allen Muhammad faces the death penalty after being found guilty Monday of capital murder and terrorism for his role in the sniper-style shootings that terrorized the Washington, D.C., area last fall.
The Virginia jury returned the decision after only a few hours of deliberation. Mr. Muhammad, 42, was found guilty of all four counts, including conspiracy and using a firearm in a crime.
Mr. Muhammad's case revolved specifically around the death of Dean Meyers, who was shot in early October of 2002 at a gas station in Virginia.
The shootings occurred in a number of jurisdictions, including Maryland and the federal district of Washington. With Attorney-General John Ashcroft pushing hard for prosecutors to be able to seek the death penalty, the case ended up in Virginia. According to Amnesty International, Virginia is known for “the relative speed at which it takes capital defendants from conviction to execution.
Although the trial featured three weeks of testimony, hundreds of piece of evidence and about 130 witnesses, jurors were quick to make up their minds. After barely six hours of deliberation, they signalled that they had reached a decision.
The sentencing phase of the trial has been postponed until after lunch.
Mr. Muhammad was tried separately from Lee Boyd Malvo, who stands accused of complicity in the series of shootings that killed 10 people over several weeks.
The prosecutors depicted Mr. Muhammad as a controlling man who manipulated his young partner into shooting a series of strangers. The description dovetailed nicely with Mr. Malvo's defence team, who portrayed their client as an instrument of Mr. Muhammad, a Persian Gulf war veteran.
"Sniping is the ability of two men to kill people and inflict terror. Who was the captain of that killing team? He's sitting right in front of you," prosecutor Richard Conway said Thursday, pointing to Mr. Muhammad.
