Sniper Delivered for 2nd Trial

Convicted sniper Lee Boyd Malvo was transferred from Virginia to Maryland on Wednesday to be tried on charges of killing six people here during the Washington-area sniper shootings in 2002.

Malvo was removed from a prison in Virginia, where he is serving a life sentence for the shooting of FBI analyst Linda Franklin in Fairfax, Va., and flown to Maryland, officials said. He was placed in the Montgomery County Jail.

Malvo’s lawyer, Harry Trainor, met with his client at the jail. A bond hearing was tentatively scheduled today, though Trainor said he didn’t know if it would be necessary because Malvo was serving a life sentence.

Malvo, 20, and John Allen Muhammad, 44, will be tried in Montgomery County on six first-degree murder counts. Muhammad was convicted in 2003 of killing Dean Meyers in Manassas, Va., and sentenced to death.

Montgomery prosecutors were the first to announce murder charges after the pair’s arrest in October 2002, but the suspects were instead sent to Virginia, which had a stronger death penalty law. Malvo, who was 17 at the time of the shootings, can no longer face execution because the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down the death penalty for juveniles.

The two states agreed this month to move Malvo and Muhammad to Maryland because Virginia prosecutors had exhausted their legal cases against the pair. Muhammad, who is being held at Virginia’s Sussex State Prison, has since challenged his transfer. The appeal will be reviewed by Virginia Gov. Mark R. Warner’s office.

Prosecutors have said additional convictions in Maryland would act as insurance if the Virginia cases were ever overturned.

Maryland has agreed to send Malvo back to Virginia to serve the rest of his sentence after the Montgomery cases are tried.

The October 2002 sniper spree terrorized the metropolitan Washington area and left 10 people dead.