Judge rules teen sniper suspect can be tried as adult

FAIRFAX, Va. -- CCiting what he called strong circumstantial evidence, a judge said Wednesday that 17-year-old sniper suspect John Lee Malvo can be tried as an adult, making him eligible for the death penalty.

Juvenile Court Judge Charles Maxfield ruled after a hearing in which prosecutors said Malvo tauntingly tried to extort $10 million from authorities during the killing spree and that fingerprints on the murder weapon and other evidence tied the teenager to four attacks -- three of them fatal.

"There is no eyewitness at any of the four crime scenes but the circumstantial evidence is quite strong," the judge said.

Malvo and John Allen Muhammad, 42, are accused of killing 13 people and wounding five others in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C., last year. They are being tried first in Virginia in separate trials.

The extortion allegation is a key element of a Virginia anti-terrorism law that allows the death penalty for killers convicted of trying to intimidate the public or coerce the government. Malvo is also charged under a statute that allows a death sentence for multiple murders.

"They wanted to negotiate for money," prosecutor Robert F. Horan said. "They said 'If you want us to stop killing people give us the money.' If that is not intent to intimidate government, I don't know what is."

Defense lawyers argued the evidence was insufficient because no eyewitnesses placed Malvo at any of the crime scenes. They also said the demand for money does not qualify as terrorism and questioned whether it should be interpreted as a motive for any alleged crime.

"This is not intimidation if you look at it. If you look at it in the broadest sense, it's blackmail," defense lawyer Michael Arif said.

Malvo is charged in Fairfax County with the Oct. 14 slaying of FBI analyst Linda Franklin outside a Home Depot store in Falls Church.

But Horan said ballistics evidence, the notes and the phone calls link Malvo to two other fatal attacks and a shooting outside an Ashland restaurant that left a patron critically wounded.

A fingerprint expert also said the only identifiable prints found on the murder weapon, a Bushmaster rifle, belonged to Malvo. The print was found on the rifle's pistol grip.