Posted on 10/26/2002 5:25:07 PM PDT by Brian Mosely
THE 17-year-old Washington sniper made a dramatic freedom bid—by punching his way through the CEILING of an interview room.
John Lee Malvo seized his chance after being left alone by FBI interrogators.
He leapt on a table and quickly smashed the flimsy ceiling tiles with his fists—then began hauling himself up into a ventilation shaft.
Agents dashed into the room, grabbed his flailing legs and wrenched the struggling teenager back down.
Last night the FBI refused to comment on the embarrassing incident at the "secure" and secret federal centre in Baltimore, Maryland.
Malvo and fellow sniper John Muhammad, 41—who face the death penalty in seven different jurisdictions —are refusing to help enquiries into their reign of terror in the US capital.
Posed
One agent said: "Never mind co-operation. They're not even talking."
The pair—who killed ten and wounded three in a 21-day spree— could also be charged with an unsolved murder on America's west coast.
Keenya Cook, 21, was killed in February with a single head shot as she opened her front door in Tacoma, Washington State, where Muhammad and Malvo were living at the time.
The assassins were friends with her family—and even posed for the now infamous picture together on their sofa.
But ex-Army marksman Muhammad, who changed his name from Williams because he converted to Islam, fell out with the Cooks when they befriended his ex-wife.
Claims of warnings about the pair to police BEFORE the killings started were piling up last night.
The Rev Al Archer, who runs the Lighthouse Mission Centre in Bellingham where the pair once lived, said he suspected the Gulf War veteran was a terrorist after September 11.
He said Muhammad distributed pro-Islam brochures, made anti-American slurs and also threatened to kill cops. He added: "If he'd been stopped at that time, a lot of people would be alive who are now dead."
Mr Archer revealed that Muhammad, who was existing on handouts, started travelling extensively by air. Harjeep Singh, who knew the snipers at a YMCA gym, said he was alarmed at their vow to go on a gun-rampage, targetting cops and fuel tankers.
Police and an FBI agent interviewed Mr Singh but no action was taken.
There were also chilling new revelations last night about how Malvo and Muhammad mocked police by repeatedly slipping through dragnets.
Their 1990 blue Chevrolet Caprice— a killing machine with holes in the boot to fire through—was first noted by police on October 3, just 24 hours after the first killing. But it was lost in the system while the entire hunt centred on a white van.
Meanwhile, Muhammad was stopped or spoken to by officers TEN times for various traffic offences.
During a spot-check on October 8, he was parked and asleep at the wheel. But cops failed to look in the boot, where they would have found the Bushmaster XM15 rifle.
The most chilling escape was last Monday when two illegal immigrants in a white van were held in a swoop as they used a phone booth being staked out by cops.
Muhammad and Malvo had given the number of the booth to detectives in a phone call. And just yards away, they were lurking in their blue Chevy, watching every move in the fiasco.
The car was even caught in the background on news footage—and still the jigsaw did not piece together.
Finally, police realised the car they were looking for. But Chief Charles Moose refused to reveal the number plate. It was only when one of his team leaked it that the pair were found one-and-a-half hours later.
civilian truck driver with a cell phone!
and he blocked the rest area exit with his truck while the keystone kops were enroute. And Moose was probably still steaming about the leaked plate number.
You tell me! So much for traditional enforcement when the people involved are more afraid of sanctions that could hamper their "career" as opposed to doing what's right - shoot the SOB!
I wonder how long they had the plate number before the leak, and the reason for witholding it.
Yes it was the first day of killings on Oct 3rd that the Caprice was also known be the single other highly suspicious vehicle of serious consideration, but Moose chose to only emphasize white trucks and vans despite D.C. Chief Ramsey's reservations. The cops also knew for a near certainty in early October from the letter language that the sniper was a minority but Moose didn't want to "paint some group." Wake up and smell the incompetence. Word is bond, yo.
The task force detectives knew from the language used in the letters that these guys were black. See: Sniper Letter Linked to [Blacks = G-d] Movement Chief Moose, being black, was in serious denial.
The cops couldn't have checked the boot. There was no probable cause. Of course they could have searched the car any of the ten times but with the charge of Racial profiling or unlawful search hanging over their heads like a big iron fist I can see why they didn't. PC is going to be the death of this country if it isn't stopped..
Would this be called infirmative action? God bless the brave soul that released the plate number.
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