Officer Places 1 Sniper Suspect at Scene

As prosecutors built their case against sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad, a police officer on Friday identified the defendant’s alleged partner as the young man he chased from the scene of a slaying in Montgomery, Ala., last year.

Another witness testified that the gun used in that shooting was a high-velocity rifle and not the handgun held by the fleeing suspect.

The prosecution team has presented evidence and witnesses this week to link Muhammad, 42, and Lee Boyd Malvo, 18, to a long string of shootings last year. The two men are charged with shooting 13 people in the Washington, D.C., area -- 10 of them fatally -- and also are allegedly tied to shootings in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Arizona and Washington state.

Muhammad is accused of killing Dean Harold Meyers, 53, at a gas station near Manassas, Va., but prosecutors also are trying to link Muhammad to other slayings to increase the chance that he will be executed.

An Alabama police officer, James Graboys, said that as he chased a suspect in his police cruiser, the suspect turned and looked at him from about 10 or 15 feet away. When showed a photograph of Malvo, Graboys said: “That was the individual I saw that night.” Graboys was the second officer to identify Malvo as the person who fled a shooting scene outside a state liquor store in Montgomery on Sept. 21, 2002, that left Claudine Parker, 52, dead and another employee, Kellie Adams, seriously wounded.

None of the prosecution witnesses placed Muhammad at the scene, but they did provide evidence that the shots came from a high-velocity rifle -- the type of weapon allegedly found in Muhammad’s car. Another police officer testified Wednesday that he arrived at the scene within minutes of the shooting, saw a young suspect looking through a purse and watched him flee while holding a handgun.

Medical examiner Emily Ward, who performed an autopsy on Parker, said the gun that caused the wound was a high-velocity rifle. Bullet fragments left a “snowstorm effect” in Parker’s torso, Ward said.

Another witness testified that a month after the shooting she found a handgun near where Graboys had chased the suspect.

Prosecutors then presented evidence about the Sept. 23, 2002, slaying of Hong Im Ballenger, 45, in the parking lot of a beauty supply store where she worked in Baton Rouge, La.

She was killed by a bullet that hit her in the back of the neck and destroyed much of the left side of her jaw, said Michael Cramer, a Louisiana state pathologist who examined her.

Cramer’s testimony wrapped up the first week of what is expected to be a six- to eight-week trial. The jury has heard from three survivors of the shootings and seen autopsy photos of three victims.

Only one witness has placed Muhammad at the scene of a shooting -- Virginia police Officer Stephen I. Bailey, who questioned Muhammad near the gas station where Meyers was shot but let him go. Prosecutors say that they have no eyewitness testimony of Muhammad shooting any of their victims.

During the first two days of the trial, Muhammad acted as his own lawyer, presenting an opening statement and cross-examining witnesses. After that, his defense team took over. Thursday’s proceedings were canceled because of a courthouse power failure.

The trial was moved from northern Virginia to Virginia Beach, at the southeast corner of the state, in search of an unbiased jury. All the jurors said they could impose a death sentence.

Currently in Virginia, a person is not eligible for the death penalty unless it is proven that he was the triggerman.

However, prosecutors also are trying to prove that Muhammad violated Virginia’s terrorism law, which was passed after Sept. 11, 2001, and could result in a death sentence.