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ROCKVILLE, Md. — In the end, one of the men arrested in connection with the sniper shootings may have given investigators their best clue.
An ominous call to the sniper task force tip line urged authorities to check out an incident in "Montgomery," triggering an investigative chain that led to the capture of two men, a law enforcement source told The Associated Press on Thursday on condition of anonymity.
The call led investigators from Montgomery, Ala., to Tacoma, Wash., to a darkened rest stop off I-70 in Frederick County, Md., where the two men were taken into custody.
Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright said a caller to the tip line apparently claimed responsibility for both the sniper shootings and a liquor store robbery in his city in which one woman was killed and another wounded.
Bright said the caller told the tip line representative to contact Montgomery officials if they didn't believe he was responsible for the sniper shootings, which began Oct. 2 and have resulted in 10 deaths.
While reviewing recent shootings in Montgomery, investigators zeroed in on a shooting outside a state liquor store on Sept. 21.
Montgomery Police Chief John Wilson said Thursday that the gun used in Alabama was not the same as the one in the Washington, D.C.-area shootings.
But the law enforcement source told the AP that police found a piece of paper at the scene that bore the fingerprints of John Lee Malvo, one of the men wanted for questioning in connection with the serial shootings.
Police traced Malvo, 17, to a rental home in Tacoma where he once lived with a former soldier named John Allen Muhammad. Muhammad, also known as John Allen Williams, has been identified in several news reports as Malvo's stepfather.
In Tacoma, neighbors told investigators that the former tenants had taken target practice in the backyard.
Pfc. Chris Waters, a Fort Lewis soldier who lives across the street, said he called police after hearing gunshots nearly every day in January.
"It sounded like a high-powered rifle such as an M-16," he said. "Never more than three shots at a time. Pow. Pow. Pow."
FBI agents swept the backyard with metal detectors before carting away a tree stump and other evidence in a U-Haul truck. The stump may have been used for target practice and was being taken to a federal lab for ballistics tests.
Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose announced shortly after midnight Thursday that Muhammad was wanted for questioning in connection with the sniper spree, calling him "armed and dangerous." The chief also complied with a curious request by the sniper to say: "We have caught the sniper like a duck in a noose."
The noose tightened at 1 a.m., when witnesses at the Maryland rest stop called police after they spotted the men sleeping inside one of the cars sought in the investigation — a blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice.
The sniper task force swept in and arrested the men without a struggle.
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MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A man seen fleeing a deadly liquor store shooting last month has "some very good similarities" to one of two men named in the Washington-area sniper investigation, authorities said Thursday.
Mayor Bobby Bright said a caller to the sniper investigation tip line apparently claimed responsibility for both the sniper shootings and the Sept. 21 shooting outside a state liquor store in Montgomery that left one woman employee dead and another seriously wounded.
The tip-line caller told authorities to contact Montgomery officials if they didn't believe he was responsible for the sniper shootings, which began Oct. 2, Bright said.
Police issued an arrest warrant Wednesday for John Allen Muhammad on a federal weapons charge and said they wanted to question him about the sniper shootings. Montgomery County, Md., Police Chief Charles Moose said Muhammad may be traveling with a juvenile, identified by a law enforcement source as 17-year-old John Lee Malvo.
Bright said a publication found at the scene of the Alabama shooting — a magazine about weapons — bore a fingerprint of Malvo's. Police then traced Malvo to a home in Tacoma, Wash., that was searched Wednesday by authorities looking into the sniper shootings. Malvo had been living in the home with Muhammad, a source told the AP.
Montgomery police Chief John Wilson said his department was cooperating with the sniper task force.
He stressed that a different caliber gun was used in the liquor store shootings, and authorities had not concluded the shooting was related to the sniper killings.
But he said an officer chased a man fleeing the liquor store shootings, at one point coming within a couple of feet of him, and helped provide a composite sketch. Asked if the person resembled Malvo, he said there were "some very good similarities, yes."
Bright said sniper investigators asked for files on the shooting and evidence, including a bullet found at the scene, and local authorities complied.
"We are fully cooperating, but we have no verification that anything here is related to the crimes in Montgomery County, Md.," Bright said.
Claudine Parker, 52, and Kellie Adams, 24, were locking up the liquor store for the night when they were shot. Parker was killed.
Adams said her back was to the street when a single shot struck her just below the base of her skull. She said the gunman had not approached them.
"I never saw a face. I never saw him, period," Adams told the Montgomery newspaper, adding that police contacted her late Wednesday about a possible connection to the shootings.
Wilson said an officer on patrol heard the shots that night and saw a man rifling through a victim's purse. But the man ran away and the officer couldn't catch him, Wilson said.