16 years after start of DC sniper spree, future of Lee Boyd Malvo remains unclear

** FILE ** Sniper suspect Lee Boyd Malvo listens to court proceedings during the trial of fellow sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad in Virginia Beach, Va., Monday, Oct. 20, 2003. The lawyer for convicted teenage sniper Malvo says his client plans to drop all appeals of his conviction and life sentence for one of 10 sniper killings in October 2002 and admit his guilt in a second slaying. (AP Photo/Martin Smith-Rodden, Pool)

Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad with his defense attorneys Peter Greenspun, bottom, and Jonathan Shapiro, top, listens in Prince William County Circuit Court in Manassas, Va., Monday, Aug. 18, 2003. Judge LeRoy F. Millette Jr. denied a request from Muhammad's lawyers Monday to hire a jury consultant to help them screen potential jurors at taxpayer expense and also denied a request for extra peremptory challenges when a jury pool is created. Muhammad, 42, and Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, have been linked toroughly two dozen shootings in several states, including a three-week spree in metropolitan Washington in October that killed 10 people. (AP Photo/Dave Ellis, Pool)

Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad looks around courtroom 10 at the Virginia Beach Circuit Court during the beginning of his trial in Virginia Beach, Va., Tuesday Oct. 14, 2003. Muhammad faces two counts of capitol murder for the shooting of Dean Harold Meyers on October 2002. (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson)

President and publisher of Bessamer Daily News in Bessamer, Ala., James Allen Gray Jr., wipes his face as he identified Lee Boyd Malvo during testimony in the trial of sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad, in courtroom 10 at the Virginia Beach Circuit Court in Virginia Beach, Va., Wednesday Oct. 22, 2003. Gray chased a suspect in a shooting at a liquor store in Alabama in 2002. (AP Photo/Davis Turner, POOL)

A view of the hole cut into the trunk of the 1990 Chevy Caprice allegedley used in the 2002 sniper shootings sits in Chesapeake police evidence compund in Chesapeake, Va., Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2003. Lee Boyd Malvo is on trial for the Oct. 14, 2002, shooting of Linda Franklin at a Home Depot in Falls Church. He faces the same two murder counts that John Allen Muhammad did: multiple murders within three years and murder as part of a terrorist plot. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer, Pool)

Kwang Im Szuska, center, sister of sniper victim Hong Im Ballenger, is escorted away from the media outside Prince William County Courthouse in Manassas, Va., Tuesday, March 9, 2004, after the sentencing of convicted sniper John Allen Mohammed. Mohammed, along with Lee Boyd Malvo, was convicted of terrorizing the Washington D.C. area in a rash of killings in 2002. Mohammed was sentenced to be executed October 14, 2004. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

**FILE** In this Tuesday March 9, 2004 file photo, convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad stands as he is sentenced to death for the shooting of Dean Meyers at the Prince William County Circuit Court in Manassas, Va. A federal judge on Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2008 rejected an appeal from convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad, who was sentenced to death for masterminding a 2002 killing spree in the Washington, D.C. region that left 10 people dead. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)

Convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad addresses Judge James L. Ryan during a media preview, Friday, April 28, 2006, in Rockville, Md. Muhammad, 45, plans to be his own lawyer as he goes on trial Monday on six murder charges for killings in Maryland during the Oct 2002 Washington area sniper spree. (AP Photo/Chris Gardner, Pool)

Names of the 10 people killed in the Washington area sniper shootings are etched into a stone in the Montgomery County arboretum in Wheaton, Md., Thursday, Sept. 23, 2004. The section of the arboretum will get a new name _ Reflection Terrace in memorial for the 10 people killed in the Washington area sniper shootings in 2002. The memorial was officially dedicated Friday, Oct. 1, 2004. (AP Photo/Chris Gardner)

A couple are silhouetted as they look at a memorial for the 10 people killed in the Washington area sniper shootings etched into a stone in the Montgomery County arboretum in Wheaton, Md., Thursday, Sept. 23, 2004. The section of the arboretum will get a new name _ Reflection Terrace in memorial for the 10 people killed in the Washington area sniper shootings in 2002. The memoria was officially dedicated Friday, Oct. 1, 2004. (AP Photo/Chris Gardner)

Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad is escorted into court in Manassas, Va., Friday, July 11, 2003. Prosecutors reversed course Friday and said they support moving the murder trial of Muhammad out of the Washington suburbs. The judge in the case of fellow suspect Lee Boyd Malvo changed the venue in that case last week. Muhammad, 42, and Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, have been linked to 20 shootings, including 13 deaths, in Virginia, Maryland, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Washington, D.C. Both face the death penalty. (AP Photo/Rod A. Lamkey Jr., Pool)

The trunk of the 1990 Caprice used by convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo is seen at the Montgomery County Judicial Center after it was entered into evidence in the murder trial of Muhammad Wednesday, May 17, 2006, in Rockville, Md. There was a hole cut in the back of the trunk and the rifle was shot out of the hole. Muhammad, who is representing himself is on trial on six murder charges for killings in Maryland during the Oct 2002 Washington area sniper spree.(AP Photo/Chris Gardner, Pool)

**SNIPER TRIAL** The Bushmaster rifle used by convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo is seen at the Montgomery County Judicial Center after it was entered into evidence in the murder trial of Muhammad, Wednesday, May 17, 2006 in Rockville, Md. Muhammad, who is representing himself, is on trial forfor the six killings in Maryland during the Oct. 2002 Washington area sniper spree.(AP Photo/Chris Gardner, Pool)

**Marion Lewis, Lori Rivera, Nelson Rivera, Joselin Rivera** Marion Lewis holds up a photo of his daughter Lori, her husband Nelson Rivera and their daughter Joselin, Thursday Oct. 15, 2009 in Mountain Home, Id. Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera was vacuuming cereal from her minivan Oct. 3, 2002 at a gas station near her Silver Springs, Md. home when she was shot down by Washington, D.C. area John Allen Muhammad and his young accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo. (AP Photo/Matt Cilley)

**Marion Lewis, Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera** Marion Lewis sits at his daughter Lori's gravesite on Oct. 15, 2009 in Mountain Home, Id. Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera was vacuuming cereal from her minivan Oct. 3, 2002 at a gas station near her Silver Springs, Md. home when she was shot down by Muhammad and his young accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo. (AP Photo/Matt Cilley)

**Sniper Execution Witness** In this Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009 photo, Bob Meyers poses for a photograph with images of his slain brother Dean Harold Meyers, in Phoenixville Pa. John Allen Muhammad is scheduled to be executed on Nov. 10 for the October 2002 slaying of Dean Harold Meyers at a Manassas gas station during a string of shootings that left 10 people dead and three wounded in Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Maryland. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

**Sniper Grip of Fear** A memorial is shown honoring the victims of the 2002 sniper shootings that gripped the metro D.C area, Friday, Nov. 6, 2009, at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Md. As Virginia prepares to execute John Allen Muhammad on Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2009, echoes of those three weeks on edge are reverberating throughout the region. (AP Photo/Rob Carr)

**APTOPIX Sniper Execution** Family members of convicted sniper John Allen Muhammad pray outside Greenville Correctional Center in Jarratt, Va., at the scheduled time of Muhammad's execution on Nov. 10, 2009. Muhammad was executed for sniper attacks that killed 10 people in Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C. during a 3-week spree in 2002. (AP Photo/ Dean Hoffmeyer)

**Sniper Execution** Marion Lewis, whose daughter Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera was killed by D.C. snipers John Allen Muhammad and Lee Malvo, sits in Jarratt, Va. after witnessing Muhammad's execution at the Greenville Correctional facility on Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2009. (AP Photo/ Dean Hoffmeyer)

Montgomery County police chief Charles Moose holds a paper with a corrected address for the public to send tips on the sniper shootings in the Washington D.C. area, during a news briefing at Montgomery County police headquarters in Rockville, Md., Monday, Oct. 14, 2002. (AP Photo/Don Wright)

Robert Coram, of Woodbridge, Va., stops at a makeshift memorial at a Shell gas station along Connecticut Avenue in Silver Spring, Md., while a friend makes a phone call from a nearby pay phone Friday, Oct. 4, 2002. Maryland police said Friday they were looking for two men, a driver and a sniper, in the fatal shootings of at least five people in the suburbs north of Washington, D.C. (AP Photo/Don Wright)

Montgomery County police chief Charles Moose updates the media about a string of sniper shootings during a news conference, Saturday, Oct. 5, 2002, at Montgomery County police headquarters in Rockville, Md. Six people were shot and killed Wednesday and Thursday, five in Maryland and one in Washington. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Six candles lit by Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, archbishop of Washington, in memory of each of the victims killed in a sniper spree shooting that began Wednesday, burn during a Mass at St. Mary's church in Rockville, Md., Saturday, Oct. 5, 2002. McCarrick chose to perform Mass at the parish following the shootings. (AP Photo/Don Wright)

Andrea Walekar center is comforted by an fellow mourner before her father's funeral service at the Sligo Seventh Day Adventist Church in Takoma Park, Md., Sunday, Oct. 6, 2002. Prem Kumar Walekar, 54, a taxi driver, slain Thursday, was one of at least six people randomly killed by sniper attacks in Washington and its suburbs. (AP Photo/Don Wright)

Police search for clues in the flower beds near the scene of a fatal shooting in Manassas, Va., Oct. 10, 2002. Dean Meyers was gunned down moments after filling his tank at the Sunoco service station in the background. Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad is is to go on trial Oct. 14, 2003, in Virginia Beach, Va., for Meyers' slaying. Defense lawyers for sniper suspects Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo successfully argued that their trials should be moved to the southeastern Virginia cities of Chesapeake and Virginia Beach to be fair. (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds, File)

A Fairfax County, Va. police officer signals to cars on Interstate 395 in Springfield, Va. Friday, Oct. 11, 2002 as police search for a sniper on the major interstate after a van was seen leaving the scene of a deadly shooting at a Virginia gas station Friday morning. It wasn't immediately clear if the shooting near Fredericksburg, Va. was linked to nine sniper attacks that have left seven people dead in the Washington area. (AP Photo/Rob Ostermaier)

Their weapons at the ready, FBI agents walk through a Rockville, Md. neighborhood Sunday, Oct. 13, 2002 after a report of shots fired. With a sniper still at bay in the Washington area, authorities respond in force to such calls. Ten people have been shot, eight fatally, by a sniper since Oct. 2. (AP Photo/Marie P. Marzi)

A "Thou Shalt Not Kill" poster is afixed on a vacuum next to a makeshift memorial at a gas station in Kensington, Md. Monday, Oct. 14, 2002 where Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera of Silver Spring, Md. was shot by sniper Oct. 3 while vacuuming her van.. Sniper investigators said Monday they have been deluged with tips, including false alarms caused by fear and anxiety, as the Washington area remained on edge despite the longest lull in the shootings that began nearly two weeks ago. (AP Photo/Ken Lambert)

A bouquet of flowers sits on the bench under a bullet hole in Silver Spring, Md. Thursday, Oct. 3, 2002 where Sarah Ramos was killed after getting off a bus at the Leisure World Shopping Center. Scores of law enforcement officers searched the Washington suburbs Friday for a sniper who they believe randomly targeted five people as they went about everyday tasks, killing each with a single shot. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Not a student is seen during normal football practice time on the field of Herndon High School in Herndon, Va., a suburb of metropolitan Washington Friday, Oct. 18, 2002. For the last two weeks in the Washington area, virtually all outdoor activities, games, practices, homecoming events, even the daily lunchtime recess have been canceled, postponed or moved inside because of a serial sniper who has killed nine people and wounded two others since Oct. 2. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Mourners weep at the funeral service for Linda Franklin, a FBI analyst, who was gunned down a week ago outside a Home Depot in Falls Church, Va., after a funeral service Monday, Oct. 21, 2002, in Arlington, Va. Her co-workers, friends, and family attended the funeral service, where candles on the the altar represented each victim of the Washington-area serial sniper. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Henrico County police officer stretches crime scene tape around a gas station in a Richmond, Va., suburb Monday Oct. 21, 2002. The station, background, was the scene of an arrest of a man in a white van. Authorities searching for the Washington-area sniper took two people into custody Monday, after surrounding a white van parked at a pay phone in the gas station. They also confirmed that Saturday night's shooting at a steakhouse outside Richmond was the work of the sniper. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Henrico County police investigators search the grounds at a gas station in suburban Richmond, Va. Monday Oct. 21, 2002. A man in a white van was arrested at the station. He and another are being questioned in relation to the recent sniper shootings. Police refused to describe them as suspects. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Montgomery County Police Chief Charles A. Moose reads from a notebook as he delivers another message to an unspecified individual during an evening news conference Monday, Oct. 21, 2002 in Rockville, Md. (AP Photo/Victoria Arocho)

Mourners carry the casket of Linda Franklin, a FBI analyst, who was gunned down a week ago outside of a Home Depot in Falls Church, Va., after a funeral service Monday, Oct. 21, 2002, in Arlington, Va. Her co-workers, friends, and family attended the funeral service, where candles on the the altar represented each victim of the Washington-area serial sniper. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

In this view from WJZ-TV video, the car in which two men were arrested at a Maryland roadside rest stop early Thursday, Oct. 24, 2002, is pushed into a facility in Rockville, Md, after being transported from the rest area. The two were wanted for questioning in the three-week wave of deadly sniper attacks that have terrorized the Washington, D.C. area. (AP Photo/courtesy WJZ-TV)

Sniper shooting suspect Lee Boyd Malvo is shown in a photo from Dec. 30, 2002, as he is escorted out of Fairfax Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court after a hearing in Fairfax, Va. Jury selection is set to begin Monday in Maryland in John Allen Muhammad's second trial, a case that will likely echo the 2003 Virginia case that ended in a death sentence for one of the 10 killings. Muhammad will represent himself and plans to call Malvo to testify.(AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

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WASHINGTON — The Beltway snipers shooting began 16 years ago in Montgomery County, Maryland, and didn’t stop until three weeks later, when John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo were arrested.

Early evening, on Oct. 2, 2002, James Martin was shot and killed in the parking lot of a Shoppers Food Warehouse, in Wheaton.

Malvo and Muhammad were convicted of murdering 10 people in the spree, that spanned Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia.

Muhammad was executed in 2009, for the Prince William County, Virginia murder of Dean Harold Meyers.

Yet, Malvo’s fate is now in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Malvo was sentenced to life in prison in Virginia for the Fairfax County murder of Linda Franklin.

He later pleaded guilty in Virginia’s Spotsylvania County, and received two life sentences. He also received life sentences for six murders in Montgomery County, Maryland.

In June 2017, a federal appeal court threw out Malvo’s four sentences in Virginia, and ordered he be resentenced, in light of Supreme Court rulings regarding life sentences for juveniles. Malvo was 17 at the time of the shootings.

Virginia has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the decision by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond.

Similar attempts to require Malvo be resentenced in Maryland have failed.

Now, the Maryland Crime Victims’ Resource Center has filed an amicus brief with the nation’s highest court, supporting Virginia’s request to overturn the order that Malvo get a new sentencing hearing.

The panel’s ruling that Malvo be resentenced “inflicts serious harm upon, and unlawfully revictimizes and disrespects victims,” according to the brief, filed by Russell Butler, representing the crime victims’ group.

The group says a new sentencing would violate the victims’ Constitutional rights of due process and would qualify as cruel and unusual punishment.

“Victims’ lives and pain can never be restored to their prior state and they have a right not to have to, unnecessarily, reopen and relive the nightmare of their loss at resentencing proceedings,” wrote Butler.

16 years after start of DC sniper spree, future of Lee Boyd Malvo remains unclear

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16 years after start of DC sniper spree, future of Lee Boyd Malvo remains unclear

Share This Gallery:

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Related News

Growing number of parents get vaccine exemptions for their kids

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