The requested article has expired, and is no longer available. Any related articles, and user comments are shown below.
© Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.DC sniper John Allen Muhammad executed in Virginia
JARRATT, Va©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
44 Comments
Login to comment
WilliB
He is not unhappy, seeing that he now is going to get his 72 virgins.
bushlover
The news keeps getting better and better today. Cheryll Witz and other victims familes should have been allowed to tear him apart. That's what I'd want to do.
malfupete
unfortunately for him, that ain't the case as Islam forbids the killing of innocents, women, children, etc.. if you believe that stuff
so pretty much every suicide bomber, pilot, etc are in fact rotting in Islam hell.
bilbobaggins
so lame they had to house this guy for 6 odd years and waste tax payer dollars. they should just execute people quickly after conviction.
smithinjapan
“He basically watched my dad breathe his last breath,” she said. “Why shouldn’t I watch his last breath?”
Are you him? No? Maybe that's ONE reason the whole eye-for-an-eye thing doesn't work. Anyway, I suppose it's one of our baser natures to seek revenge, and call watching some be executed 'justice', but I still don't agree with the death pentalty regardless of what the person did. You kill him/her, and you're no better.
HonestDictator
fortunately that doesn't happen Bilbo, Remember some cases show that a person is innocent after a few years if not more time. I'm not against execution a convicted felon accused of such heinous crimes, but there needs to be no shadow of doubt that person is not innocent at all of the crimes they are convicted of. Some people have actually been put in prison when they have been innocent.
thepaceisglacia
He didn't look "unafraid" in the news photos yesterday.
Suzu1
The death penalty is not revenge. It is simply the punishment that fits the heinous nature of the crime. To compare the execution of a man who was found guilty after an exhaustive trial and unlimited resources provided for his defense to his heartless gunning down of innocents doing nothing more than mowing their lawn or waiting for the bus is simply taking moral equivalency to its meaningless extreme.
Eyeblack
What is the moral equivalency to executing an innocent person? Many have been, and all were relatively poor.
palisadez54
I'm definitely for the death penalty. So to those people against it, if a killer tied you up and made you watch him/her kill your loved one(s), then untie you, you wouldn't want to kill that person, or at least want him/her dead?...just curious.
adaydream
I'm not an advocate of the death penalty, but he's gone. < :-)
bilbobaggins
honest dictator - thats a risk id be willing to take :)
PoolofZen
Ahh yes, a little good ole' fashioned deterrent... He'll never victimize anyone again.
PoolofZen
So, smithinJapan.... Are you saying the woman who's family member's head exploded from a bullet while going about there business is just as bad as the person who shot the bullet.... (Repeatedly shot several people I might add)....
Please, give us a break.
stirfry
injection was too good for this loser...shoulda shipped his a** to Utah for the firing squad
SuperLib
Well I had my car stereo stolen once and I wanted to find the guy and kick the crap out of him, but that was besides the point. The laws aren't decided upon "How would you feel if" theories, they're set by impartial 3rd parties who are better able to make a rational decisions.
The death penalty should be abolished. It's outdated, it doesn't stop people who murder, and in the end the system is run by people who have shown in the past that they're capable of making mistakes and convicting the wrong people....because they're human.
nath
I am anti-death penalties. Let the clowns sit in jail and give them minimum food and water. No cigs, no tv, no exercise.
eigonosensei
They should have used him for sniper practice. Practical karma. ^ ^
tkoind2
The death penalty brings our society down to the level of the killer. It sends a clear message that problems can be solved through violence when the state should be showing the higher moral and humanitarian ground.
This guy was a monster. But killing him made monsters of society as well. He should have been put in jail to rot and to live with his crime for a very long time. That is true punishment and payment for his crimes. Death is easy. You just die and that is the end of it. No awareness or consciousness, just a few hours of fear. How does that pay for crime?
A life of isolation and restriction is true punishment.
franz75
Yelnats: same for me. dried bread and water.
tkoind2
palisadez54
I want to answer your question directly. The answer is no.
My loved ones are non-violent people. They are gentle and giving people. They would suffer themselves before allowing another to suffer. And they would be merciful even to someone terrible.
Would I want to kill him/her. Maybe the first natural reaction would be to want to. But I know my loved ones would not want me to become a killer. And I know intellectually and spiritually that killing is wrong and does nothing to restore my loved one to me or to make anything "right."
What would I want done? Justice. A life behind bars would let me live in confidence that this person was paying for his/her crime and secure from harming another person's loved one.
We are no longer animals. We should raise ourselves beyond revenge and killing.
bilbobaggins
easy solution: allow the family of the victim to decide whether the criminal is put to death
DXXJP
Funny thats what some muslim countries do.
victimcrat
John Allen Muhammed probably wishes he'd taken out a soldier or two on his shooting spree. Then he'd have the whole silly progressive left whimpering that he must have snapped, that it could've happened to anyone.
proxy
Very sad. He was a Golf War veteran that cam back a nut job. His lawyers even produced brain scans that proved his brain was not normal.
If anyone deserves the death penalty it is those guys that raped the Iraqi girl and then killed her and her family.
Madverts
I'm on the fence with this issue. People like Muhammed or kiddly fiddlers when there is absolutely no doubt about their crimes then I can't say I lose any sleep.
What really sickens me are the posters braying about revenge, like forcefully strapping a person down and legally killing them with a cocktail of drugs will bring such a thing.....and of course, there's the even sicker people that go and watch an execution. I think inviting people along to watch is truly barbaric.
Madverts
.....crat,
So what you're saying is that the actions of this paticualr individual are not those of someone who has snapped?
Heh, that explains quite a lot for me.
victimcrat
"He was a Golf War veteran that cam [sic] back a nut job."
If he was a mental case it is worth noting his choice in religion.
Madverts
"If he was a mental case it is worth noting his choice in religion."
That's because all nutters are born arabs and muslims without exception and hate America. I'm so glad you're here to point out the cold hard facts to the shrieking leftist ninnies here!
Madverts
I also have serious doubts that this guy was endorsing suicide bombings against US troops in front of other US troops. That's as credible as one of sabiwabi's scoops...
victimcrat
'Malvo said Muhammad wanted to extort $10 million from the government to set up a camp in Canada where homeless children would be trained as terrorists.'
He probably wished he had become a community organizer, with ACORN.
WilliB
Madverts:
Take a look at his writings and drawings. After converting to islam, he went whole throttle, dreaming of suicidibe bombings and more 9/11s, culimating in his personal jihad. Death is not a particular deterrent for such a person, since in his mind he is going to paradise and the virgins.
dolphingirl
smithinjapan and 2koind2: I'm with you on this one. I don't believe in the death penalty. If you try to argue that it's not just revenge but some kind of 'moral equivalency law' then you are saying that if someone steels your car, the best way to make everything right is to steel that person's car. And if you argue that only people who are 100% guilty, without any reasonable doubt, should be executed, then we would have to have an absolutely flawless justice system and that is pretty much impossible.
I think the reason why some people are for the death penalty is because we don't want to look at our own dark sides. We are afraid that another human, essenitally the same as us, could do something so terrible. So to make this human ugliness go away, the simplest thing to do is just kill it. This kind of reaction is purely emotional and has no reason behind it.
M51T
John Allen Muhammad was executed because the justice system's "reaction is purely emotional and has no reason behind it."
Seriously, try reading some statutes and on how laws are passed.
WilliB
According to Malvo, Muhammad had a two-phase plan -- six shootings a day for a month, followed by a wave of bombings of schools, school buses and children's hospitals. Malvo said that when he asked Muhammad why, the older man replied: ''For the sheer terror of it -- the worst thing you can do to people is aim at their children.''
http://homelandsecurityus.com/?p=3231
Foxie
Whilst I am against death penality too, I have problems understanding how the victims families can sit behind glass and watch him or someone die. How can a country even allow such an atrocity? I find that as shocking as what he did.
sailwind
I think the reason that people would be for the death penalty is based on the rational assumption that a person such as this one has worked hard to deserve it really hard. There is really no emotional reason behind rewarding a person getting what he or she really deserves....That is called justice and this one just got it. No
pathat
The death penalty was the appropriate punishment in this case, as a family member of one of the victims said yesterday, "He had a debt to pay to society."
Good-bye and good riddance, John Muhammad.
TheQuestion
Good
JohnBecker
Most people here in the States believe that the death penalty is called for in at least some cases. For someone like this, who terrorized a region over a period of time and killed completely random victims, there certainly is no sense of mercy or compassion or forgiveness. Society wanted its pound of flesh, and it got it last night.
Those of you who don't believe in the use of the death penalty: I don't agree with you, but I can see the point you're making. I will always believe there's a place for it, when used judiciously. I can't think of a more appropriate scenario for its use than in this case.
HonestDictator
@ Bilbo, A risk you'd be willing to take unless its you, or someone you know you mean? Your statement lacks wisdom. As I said, there needs to be a few years before an execution just in case any evidence arises that proves a person may be innocent. I don't think this man is innocent, but all death row inmates need time for their cases to be cemented to be sure they are completely guilty of the charges.
usaexpat
Real shame about that one. This coward picked off innocent people unseen. I think they should turn him loose and conduct the execution ala "Running Man" Rot in h*ll you coward, good riddance.
skipthesong
I really think until you've been in the position where someone in your family has been killed in such a manner, you really shouldn't be pushing your agenda. Put them in jail for life? look at some stats, there are a lot of killers who don't get life and a very particular killer of a particular someone was out of jail in less than ten years.
Maybe you want to risk it and say well its better for the big picture, but again, until you're a victim, you really don't have a moral right to push.
For the above poster: "I think the reason why some people are for the death penalty is because we don't want to look at our own dark sides." YOu have got to be kidding me. Perhaps you are planning something and would prefer the prissy-like win as you are afraid to face your fate.
Look, if you decide to kill someone, how about making sure the state you are doing it in doesn't have capital punishment.
The758
If one of the victims was a family member of mine, I would've seen him sent to the firing squad, or better yet a beheading. He showed no remorse, why should I spend my tax money to feed and house him in prison for the rest of his undeserved life?
That's just my opinion, however. I'm sure there are people out there who disagree with it.