D.C. sniper attacks



Locations of the fifteen sniper attacks in the D.C. area numbered chronologically.

Location: Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C. and Arizona, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, and Washington
Date: February 16, 2002 – September 26, 2002 (preliminary shootings);
October 2, 2002 – October 24, 2002 (sniper attacks)
Target: Civilians in the Washington Metropolitan Area

The D.C. sniper attacks (also known as the Beltway sniper attacks) were a series of coordinated shootings that occurred during three weeks in October 2002 throughout the Washington metropolitan area, consisting of the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia. Ten people were killed, and three others were critically wounded.

The snipers were John Allen Muhammad (age 41 at the time) and Lee Boyd Malvo (age 17 at the time), who traveled in a blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice sedan. Their crime spree, which began in February 2002, included murders and robberies in several states, which resulted in seven deaths and seven injuries. In total, the snipers killed 17 people and wounded 10 others in a 10-month span.

In September 2003, Muhammad was sentenced to death, and in October, Malvo, a juvenile, was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences without parole. In November 2009, Muhammad was put to death by lethal injection.

In 2017, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit vacated Malvo's three life sentences without parole in Virginia on appeal, with re-sentencing ordered pursuant to the Supreme Court's ruling in the case of Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460, 132 S.Ct. 2455 (2012), which held that mandatory life sentences for juvenile criminals without possibility of parole violated the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari, with oral arguments held on October 16, 2019. Should he be resentenced, Malvo's minimum prison sentence will be determined by a judge; the available maximum sentence would be life imprisonment. The ruling does not apply to the six life sentences Malvo received in Maryland. On February 25, 2020, after the passage of a Virginia law allowing those who are serving life sentences for offenses committed before the age of 18 to seek release after serving 20 years, the U.S. Supreme Court case was dismissed at the request of lawyers on both sides.

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Preliminary shootings

On February 16, 2002, 21-year-old cashier Keenya Nicole Cook was shot and killed by Lee Malvo at the front door of her aunt's home in Tacoma, Washington. Cook's aunt, Isa Nichols, had been good friends with John Allen Muhammad's ex-wife Mildred and had encouraged her to seek a divorce.

On March 19, 2002, Jerry Taylor, 60, was killed by a single shot to the chest fired from long range as he practiced chip shots at a Tucson, Arizona, golf course. Muhammad's sister lived near the golf course, and he was visiting her at the time of the shooting.

Two deaths and four injuries followed in other states from March through July 2002.

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Attacks in the Baltimore–Washington Area

DC and Montgomery County, Maryland



A hole was cut at the rear of the blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice driven by Muhammad and Malvo, as a firing port to be used during their attacks. This allowed them to remain hidden and escape the scene following their attacks.

At 5:20 p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002, a shot was fired through the window of a Michaels craft store in Aspen Hill. The bullet narrowly missed Ann Chapman, a cashier at the store. Since no one was injured, the shot was assumed to be random, and no serious alarms were raised. However, approximately one hour later, at 6:30 p.m., James Martin, a 55-year-old program analyst at NOAA, was shot and killed at 2201 Randolph Road, in the parking lot of a Shoppers Food Warehouse grocery store located in Wheaton.

On the morning of October 3, four people were shot dead within a span of approximately two hours in Aspen Hill and other nearby areas in Montgomery County. Another was killed that evening in the Takoma neighborhood of the District of Columbia.

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