Posted on 10/04/2002 3:38:51 PM PDT by RaceBannon
FRIDAY OCTOBER 4 2002
FBI: Maryland shootings fit no category Agency profilers can see no motive other than terrorism
Posted: October 4, 2002 3:10 p.m. Eastern
By Paul Sperry © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
WASHINGTON – It's not gang-banging. Or spree-shooting. Or armed robbery. And it's not a serial killer.
So what would motivate two assailants to randomly target five victims in a Maryland suburb, and possibly a sixth in D.C., killing each with a single shot from a high-powered rifle?
The calculated shootings, which took place Wednesday and Thursday, are like none that federal investigators have seen.
"If some sicko just wants to go out and essentially assassinate a bunch of random people – and he's not a terrorist – it's almost like a new category" of crime, said a veteran FBI agent.
The perpetrators aren't spree shooters, FBI profilers have concluded.
Typically, spree shooters are loners who snap one day and fire away until police appear and they come to their own violent end.
They typically seek revenge on an employer, such as the post office, or fellow students at a school. They come to the scene loaded with weapons, and take a stand, spraying victims with bullets.
But in this case, two men in a white van or "box truck" did not spray bullets, but picked targets, trained a rifle, or rifles, on their victims and aimed to kill, like trained assassins.
"In a spree shooting, there are usually a lot of people wounded," said one agent. "The shooter is not really taking time to aim."
"This is much more cold and calculated than the typical spree shooting," he said. "The victims were not wounded."
What's more, the sniper, or snipers, didn't take a stand, but sped off to avoid capture.
"This is different – they've taken great steps to avoid being apprehended," he added.
Authorities are said to have a description of the shooters but are not releasing it. They've reviewed video tapes from security cameras at some of the businesses where the shootings took place.
"The idea of terrorism is to spread fear," said one law enforcement officer. "If that's what they wanted to do, they've succeeded, because there's a lot of fear in the Washington area right now."
Related story:
Terror link to Maryland shootings? http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=29178
Paul Sperry is Washington bureau chief for WorldNetDaily. © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com, Inc.
'Official Immunity' only keeps him safe from Officials...
If you're the target. If not, you have a chance.
Harder to drop the hammer on. And when you're keenly aware that one small f***-up may equal death or worse, let's see what YOUR heart rate is like :o)
Forgive my cynicism, but the FBI, you'd have to admit, has an underlying motive in portraying the 9/11 terrorists as having "amazing skill." I seem to remember that these guys took flying lessons and openly told their instructors that they weren't interested in landing, which, of course, alerted agents (whose warnings were ignored) that they should be investigated. As far as planning goes, that was the result of many practice trips, exploitation of wide-open security lapses in our system (not least of which was the knowledge that flight crews were regularly instructed not to fight back) -- and luck.
These murders exhibit a high degree of skill -- my point being that it's unlikely that there are many more marksman out there capable of multiple hits with the same precision. Single, surprise hits, maybe.
In that case the killer belonged to one of a number of "Identity" churches. These are neo-Nazi operations whose false prophets preach evil doctrines.
You're thinking of Benjamin Smith, a member of the World Church of the Creator, hq'ed in East Peoria, Illinois. The World Church of the Creator isn't an Identity group, but rather they worship whiteness (Christianity, you see, was founded by a Jew). You can do a google search on them, because I'm not going to put up a link.
Smith killed two people, one of them Ricky Byrdsong, a former Northwestern basketball coach, and injured about a half a dozen more, a number of them being Orthodox Jews. He committed suicide when the police tried to capture him. http://www.cnn.com/US/9907/05/illinois.shootings.02/
This shooting does have some similiarities to Smith's shootings in that the victims are selected randomly (I remember that Smith did his shootings from his car, like these). The difference is that the victim selection appears not to be based on race or religion, but simply because the victims were in the wrong place at the wrong time for these snipers.
In this case, I think their religious beliefs might be of more interest than their race. White, black, oriental or middle eastern, all are represented in Islam. (take note that I said might not should)
LOL!
Well the shooter did open fire. And a still standing live target isn't much different than a paper target with a 12 x 18 inch hit zone, and anyone can do that with a decent rifle and just a little bit of training (I often teach people to shoot my .223 Daewoo and have never failed to have a non shooter consistantly hitting milk jugs at 125 yards in less than 20 shots with open sights). I'm assuming that the shooter would pick out the easiest to hit targets, not people jogging or running their dog.
I doubt it. I'm not any of us have the cojones for that kind of thing anymore. If 9-11, with dancing in the streets and support rallies in American cities won't do it, then a few sniper-shots sure as hell won't.
"If some sicko just wants to go out and essentially assassinate a bunch of random people – and he's not a terrorist – it's almost like a new category" of crime, said a veteran FBI agent.
I think people are mis-reading the above. I think what it says is... that if this were just some sicko that wanted to just kill people at random, and this person wasn't a terrorist, then they have to add a new category. They already said in the opening line that there is no motive other than terrorism.
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