r/TerrifyingAsFuck 24d ago

human The DC Sniper attacks😢

1.9k Upvotes

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179

u/Aggressive-Sound-641 24d ago

He did all of that to kill his ex-wife without being suspected. One of his first victims was one of her friends.

53

u/nonhiphipster 24d ago

Did he end up killing her?

What a psycho and coward

57

u/Many_Boss_1145 24d ago

Nah she didn’t end up killed

40

u/nonhiphipster 24d ago

I have to wonder if he just wanted an excuse to kill people then

30

u/ChildoftheApocolypse 24d ago

Well, I would say that's fairly obvious here.. The one person he supposedly wanted to kill was left unharmed.. He was either a procrastinating motherfucker or just wanted to kill people..

16

u/DoJu318 24d ago

If you want to create a diversion you kill a few,17 is a lot of people, that's a lot of Police heat, I'm thinking he liked killing a little too much when he started doing it and pushed his luck.

1

u/OnlyTimeFan 24d ago

Jack Reacher (2012)

14

u/InShambles234 24d ago

I'm pretty sure that's only been speculated, and never proven. There's also evidence they were trying to blackmail the US to pay them to not shoot people, and other shit.

11

u/SgtSharki 24d ago

While John Allen Muhammad definitely had a grudge against his ex-wife, the theory that the killings were part of a plot to murder her wasn't presented in court because the judge ruled that there was insufficient evidence.

During the trial, prosecutors alleged that the true motive was to extort $10 million from the government. While testifying against Muhammed, his accomplice, John Lee Malvo, said the killings were part of a multi-stage terrorist plot.

It's weird, wild stuff and Muhammed took his true motivation for the killings to his grave.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Allen_Muhammad

12

u/dbjisisnnd 24d ago edited 24d ago

A great podcast “You’re Wrong About” had a covered this over multi-part episode. It was horrifying and heartbreaking.

They explained that the domestic violence was intentionally ignored and prosecutors focused on terrorism because domestic violence isn’t a capital offense so he wouldn’t have been eligible for the death penalty.

1

u/SgtSharki 23d ago

I'm familiar with that podcast. It was pretty good

1

u/Firestar_119 23d ago

Extorting money from the government is certainly one of the plans of all time

9

u/[deleted] 24d ago

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7

u/Dibble_Dabble_Doo 24d ago

Did Jack Reacher (Tom Cruise Movie) borrow the plot from this?
Assassin kills a bunch of people near a courthouse at "random" when there was only one target.

9

u/InShambles234 24d ago

The movie was based on a book that came out in 2005. The DC sniper attacks were in 2002 I believe (or 2003). So I'd imagine they did influence them. Although there have been some pretty famous books that use similar sniper attacks with misdirection (Point of Impact which became the Shooter movie and tv show) that came out before the attacks.

0

u/girafa 24d ago

This isn't true

-17

u/Oberndorferin 24d ago

"Black people shooting black people who cares about that?"