Hi everyone, this is Deb from Dying to be Found. Before we get started today, I just
wanted to mention that episodes contain disturbing discussions on harmful acts and crimes against
animals and or humankind. Recordings are not intended for young or sensitive audiences
due to the content nature of this podcast. Listener discretion is strongly advised.
Hi everyone, I'm Deb and I'm Beth and welcome to Dying to be Found. Beth, how are you doing
today or how are you feeling about this podcast? I'm really getting excited. I finally finished
some of my research that I've been doing and I hope to be the host in a couple of weeks.
Absolutely. I am looking forward to that. Let's turn the tables there and I know I'm
excited because you have a story and I've heard of the person. I just don't know anything
about the person so I can't wait to hear that story. It's a good one. There's so much I
want to cover. I can't wait. I really can't wait. This is exciting. So how's your week
going Deb? Oh gosh, it's going really good. I have been telling some people about a situation.
You know what the term getting back on the horse means, right? Yes. So at Christmas time,
my husband decided that he wanted me to go out and buy a dirt bike because he's been
riding Hardleys for all of his entire life, right? And he thinks it's a good idea for
me to go ahead and just pick up a motorcycle and think I can drive it around. No, I have
not been on a motorcycle my entire life so I don't know what I'm doing. But he did talk
me into buying a little dirt bike and I thought, okay, I can do this. So my son came over for
the day and we are in the driveway and he is showing me a couple things on what to do.
Cory goes out and rides the bike for a bit and then he comes back. So it was my turn,
right? So I get on the bike and I am doing just fine. I take a left out of the driveway.
I go up the hill. I come back, turn around and at that point in time, Beth, I'm thinking
freedom. This is feeling good. I am feeling good. Okay, I'm going to pass the driveway.
So I wait, I went, I kept going. And then the next thing you know, I come up to the
road to turn around and I, I don't know if I forgot to break or I excelled, but I ended
up doing a little bit of a topsy-turny and falling off the first time I ever got on the
dirt bike. Oh, that's, I'm really sorry to hear that. Well, no worries. I just couldn't
get my nails done for about a month and I'm all, I'm all healed up. But guess what? What?
I got back on that horse this weekend. So how did it go? It went very well. This time
we did like I wanted to, to begin with, let's go to an open field. That's completely flat
and give the, give the little dirt bike a whirl. So I ended up just, I don't know, driving
in circles for no joke, probably about an hour and just went around in circles. And
then John was like, stop going in that direction. You need to turn around and go in the opposite
direction. Kind of like unwind, right? Yes. And so I decided that, okay, I'll, I'll give
it a try. And I did that for a little while, but then I ended up doing like a crazy eight.
You just go in the shape of an eight. So I was getting all the best of both worlds of
turning to the left and turning to the right. And I didn't even fall down this time. I'm
proud of me. Yeah, me too. So you know, on Facebook, John has it listed as he'll talk
about his wife and the motorcycle. It's a little, it's a little mini dirt bike as in
I thought it was a huge honkin thing. The way he talks about it. That's awesome. No,
I'm not that good, but no, do you know what the brand, I don't, I'm not going to say the
brand because they're not sponsoring us right now, but maybe you will. Do you go camping?
I used to. So there's a particular brand that a lot of people take with them as far as supplies.
Yeah. This company makes a little mini dirt bike. Oh, that's cool. It's a pole start like
a lawnmower. So no, it's not road ready. Oh my gosh. So yeah, that's what I did last weekend
and I'm proud of me because I didn't fall down this time. Yeah. You can wear those,
one of those big Sumo suits, you know, that and then drive that. And then when you fall,
it just bounce right back up. Yep. So that's what I did. So do you want to get started?
Yeah. Okay. So let's see today. We are going to talk about the beltway snipers, also known
as the Washington DC snipers. And I know we were just talking a little while ago about
the possibility of if you've heard this one or not, and we decided that you did because
I'm assuming that it's international news at this point, especially because of the storyline.
So I just kind of wanted to start it off by letting you know that for 23 days between
October 2nd and October 24th of 2002, the Maryland DC and Virginia areas were terrorized
by unknown snipers who randomly shot people as they went about their day. And these incidents
were referred to as both the Washington DC and the beltway sniper attack. Random acts
of violence occurred throughout that region with people like you and me. So basically
somebody was on the attack of snipers. They were shooting at people. Basically when people
were mowing their grass, they went out shopping, they pumped gas, going out to dinner, even
a school bus driver who was idling his bus, probably waiting for a certain time to go
pick up the students, even he was shot and somebody was even just reading a book. So
yeah, it was just random. There was no rhyme or reason whatsoever to this situation. So
imagine, I don't know if you remember seeing this on the news, I just know there was a
lot of people just scared because you couldn't do anything without wondering if something
was going to happen to you today. As a matter of fact, one of the victims was an FBI intelligence
analyst and her name was Linda Franklin. She was shot just from leaving a home improvement
store with her husband. She was out shopping for the day. That's sad. Yeah. I make a point
of watching the American news every night because I hear and I see the Canadian news
a lot that I like to know what's going on in the States because I know a lot of times
it affects what goes on in Canada. Most definitely. So Montgomery County in Maryland headed up
all the all the investigations, but they also called in the FBI pretty quickly because this
thing escalated very quickly. Now, when I'm talking about this, I will say that it doesn't
seem like it escalated, but once the the people that were involved with this hit the DC area,
everything just kind of imploded. You know what I mean? Yes. So more than 400 FBI agents
were assigned to the case. They set up a hotline so people could call in tips. Expert agents
began analyzing behavior patterns and mapping out all the areas of the assaults. We've talked
about how you see a map up on the wall and then you've got the pins in them with strings
that attach. So it's kind of pinpointing where all of the incidents are occurring. So they
began to look for behavioral patterns of people in the area mapping out the assaults. So the
perpetrators I'm going to go ahead and tell you their names because as we talk, I'll be
probably mentioning their names pretty frequently. John Alan Muhammad was 41 years old at the
time and Lee Melvo was 17. And this is just a little duo of two people that were going
around terrorizing everybody. There was a caller who called into the hotline and he
had mentioned that he had a friend of his come by his house in that Tacoma, Washington
area and he had a companion with him. So one of Muhammad's friends who lived in the Tacoma,
Washington area called that hotline and said, I was in the army with a guy named John Alan
Williams, but he changed his name later to John Alan Muhammad. And I really hate to say
this, but I think your shooter might be this friend of mine from the army. That is really
interesting that somebody would call on a whim that it could be a person they know.
Oh yeah. And that was really good that he actually did that call. And you know, so many
people say, Oh no, it couldn't be. They asked him if they knew who that companion was. And
if by chance that Muhammad's companion went by the name Melvo and the friend said, well,
I did meet someone that fits that description, but his name was sniper. And then they, the
friend was later shown a picture of Melvo. And then at that point in time, he was positively
identified the police for some reason already had a good idea of what was going on. And
I'll, I'll get into that in just a bit, but they already had a pretty good idea by the
time they set up the hotline that these two people were Muhammad in Melvo. And let me
just give you a little bit of a background on the suspects. Cause I think it's kind of
important. You noticed I said that Muhammad was 41 and Melvo was 17. That's a big age
gap. It sure is. Yeah. So, uh, you know, you have to wonder where did they meet and why
are they hanging out with each other? Well, Muhammad and Melvo were actually in a sexual
relationship after Muhammad and his wife divorced. And they met by chance in 2000 at an electronic
store in Antigua, Jamaica, where Melvo was living and they hit it off immediately. So
this was around the same time that Muhammad had just left his wife and he was losing custody
of his kids. So I guess he just decided that he was going to take a trip to Jamaica to
kind of cool off, you know, and Muhammad became a mentor to Melvo after he was left to live
with his friends because Melvo's mom went to work on the other side of the Island and
basically abandoned him. So Melvo is living on people's couches and doesn't really have
a parent, a parental figure. And so Muhammad just decided to take him under his wing. Well,
I mean, what they do next is pretty horrific. So I just kind of wonder why did Melvo not
even go with his mother? So how big is Jamaica? I have no idea. I don't, you know, one, you
all know I'm not good at math, but secondly, secondly, like how big is the Island that
she goes to the other side to work, but she doesn't take her own son. I don't understand
that. Maybe our listeners from Jamaica can chime in with that answer. That would be wonderful.
Yeah. Jamaica, give us a, send us an email. We would love to know how big the Island is
because in my research, I didn't think to do that before I started this. So maybe next
time I will be a little bit more prepared. So in the meantime, yeah. So his mom left
him there with friends and Muhammad kind of took her, took him under his wing. Just so
you know, Muhammad was a Gulf war vet and taught Melvo how to shoot a rifle. And he
also put Melvo through some special training exercises. You want to know what those were?
I do. I'd be very intrigued. Well, Muhammad liked to chain Melvo up for hours just to
stand outside in the snow in order to prepare him to stand up for interrogations. But wait
a minute, are they in Jamaica? They don't have snow in Jamaica. Nope. Because it's a
tropical Island. So I guess we were saying at some point in time after Muhammad brought
Melvo to the, to the United States, then he started putting him through some training
exercises, which would be rough. Yeah. So he changed them up, had him stand outside
in the snow for hours just to kind of break them down. Well, not really just not to break
them down, but to harden him up to stand up to interrogations. So what, what was he expecting
to be interrogated on? Right? Exactly. Melvo also endured a lot of brainwashing and was
tested by killing someone close to Muhammad's ex-wife. So basically he, it was almost like
he was initiated into a, a gang, but a gang of two, right? Because he was tested and he
actually did kill someone who was close to Muhammad's ex-wife. And he basically walked
up to their house, talked to that person for a few minutes and then shot her when he walked
outside like nothing ever happened. So he went in, made friends, chit-chatted for a
couple of minutes and then just pulled out a gun, shot her and walked out like nothing
happened. After this occurrence, Melvo felt like he was initiated. Okay. So apparently
they started a string of violence across the country. And a couple of articles that I read
said that Muhammad and Melvo began robbing and killing people in February of 2002. This
was eight months prior to the Beltway incidents and Muhammad and Melvo, Melvo drove across
Arizona, Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida. In their wake, they left 17 people
dead and wounded another 10 more. So it turns out that basically Muhammad was pretty pissed
off that he had lost custody of his three kids during the divorce from his wife. So
he thought it would be a good idea to attack the government and the police. Now, not really
sure what they would have to do with anything with this divorce, besides maybe going to
court and having divorce papers written up or signed. He just thought it was a good idea
to attack the government and police and just make a big statement of his own. Now, I basically
aligned the states up like we were driving across the country. If you're looking at the
map, I kind of put those states in the order, but that's not really the timeline. And there
was no set itinerary. There was no timeline on which state they were in. They didn't literally
drive across the country as it seems that they would to make their way to Washington,
DC area, but they basically attacked people anywhere they went. One person was attacked
in Washington state, which is on the West Coast in February. So that's when everything
started. Then one person was attacked in Arizona a month later, which would be March. And then
the two took a break until September. So they had a little cooling off period. And then
they ended up attacking one person in Georgia, Alabama, and then Louisiana. So really they're
just doing a zigzag all over the United States at this point in time. At one point, one witness
reported a suspicious white van that led police in a completely different direction for a
little while, because we know if you see one in a parking lot, do not park next to it.
Absolutely. Now, even though many other witnesses reported a suspicious blue sedan in the areas
of the attacks, it was that one witness who reported the white van that kind of threw
the police off for a little while. And Montgomery County, Maryland police chief, Charles Moose
admitted that they had gotten it all wrong. This guy, I'm sorry, Charles Moose, you have
got the coolest name ever. Yay. Charles Moose. Can you imagine? Hello, my name is Charles
Moose. Oh, I mean, I don't think I heard what you said because Moose is such a, that's a
strong name, sir. All right. Getting back to the story, white van versus blue sedan,
white male versus African-American. I'm not sure in the readings, if anybody reported
that there were white males versus African-Americans, but I'm going to assume that the person who
ever was driving the white van was a white male. So no, this is what happened. I remembered
reading this now. So they were doing a profile on the people that might have been doing this.
And so when they were profiling the criminals, they said they believed it was a white male.
And so that's when Moose came in and said that they were wrong. It was completely opposite.
And anyway, so yeah, Mr. Moose or chief Moose, I'm glad that you have a cool name. I'm glad
that you admitted your mistakes. And I got nothing else to add to that. So what was going
on in the news at this point is that they began hanging tarps up at gas stations. I
specifically remember that happening was that people would have, or gas stations would have
tarps put up to block the public because you know, what are snipers known for? Yeah. Targeting
anybody that's moving. Yeah. Anybody that's moving and in their path of the crosshairs
right? Yep. So they had tarps to put up while people were getting gas. I remember them being
interviewed. They were definitely talking about the scary situation at the time. I mean,
but you got to get gas. What else can you do? So they did believe that the people that
or the person that they were trying to find was 20 to 30 years old, a white male with
military background. Definitely I can see military background on this if they're working
in like sniper operatives. So the training, the training of Melville. Yes. And I love
the psychology behind this profiling. I mean, I've seen some of these cop shows where they
do that. And I mean, it's almost, it's impressive that they can really pinpoint things down.
You know what I mean? I agree. In fact, I just ordered a book from our local bookstore.
It's on profiling and they thought it looked like such an interesting title that I had
coming in that they wanted to order one for their store too. Wow. Because of the title.
Yep. They were checking me out when the book came in and she looked through it and said,
I think we'll better get one for our store. Wow. So Mohammed and Melville went on to make
some pretty bold moves as time progressed and they developed a God complex. One of the
victims was a 13 year old boy named Iran Brown. It's either Iran or Iran who was getting out
of his aunt's car just to go into school for the day. He was running late. So I think he
missed the bus and then he would just, you know, his aunt had to drive him to school
and well, when he got out of the car, he was shot in the chest and a tarot card with the
Grim Reaper was left near the scene, which had a note warning police not to do anything
as far as taking this situation or this occurrence to the news media. So my question here is
if this child was attacked getting out of the car and nobody saw them, then how did
the tarot card get there at the scene? Good point. Well, a four page letter, and by the
way, I don't think that this child died and a four page letter was pinned to a tree by
one victim who was a shot while leaving a restaurant. And in the letter Mohammed and
Melville demanded $10 million. And so when the authorities did not deliver, they ended
up killing five more people. The FBI went on to investigate and on October 17th, 2002,
someone else called the hotline and said that they were the sniper and they also committed
an armed robbery in Montgomery, Alabama in September. Now, this is the interesting part.
I told you that once everything hit the Washington DC area, that things seemed to really implode
and there was a ton of activity going on, but they spent eight months, like I said a
little bit earlier, they spent eight months leading up to this. And whoever it was that
called the hotline stated that they committed an armed robbery in Montgomery, Alabama earlier
that year. So upon investigation of the phone call, the FBI discovered that an incident
like this did in fact occur and that fingerprints and ballistic evidence were collected at that
crime scene in Alabama. So there was a magazine that Melville left behind, and I want to say
it was some kind of hunting magazine that I've seen in a picture somewhere. He left
that magazine behind after the robbery. And so they were able to collect fingerprints
off of that. The evidence was quickly sent to a lab and came back with Lee Boyd Melville's
prints on the magazine, which was left at the scene. So at least they had that to go
on. Right now, Mohammed was also mentioned in this report. And on October 22nd, the FBI
searched the criminal record database and found out that Mohammed owned a blue Chevy
Capri with New Jersey license plate number NDA 21Z or Zed. So they obviously did their
homework rather quickly. And uh oh, you all, you know what happens when Beth jumps off
the system here. I think I'm going to have to tell you all a story. Let's see. I don't
know if I have a good story. So there was one time she brought a boy home. She was at
the dating age and it was kind of cool because I think his name was Bob. Bob was, I guess,
trying to impress my parents because he was introduced to them and we were talking in
the kitchen. Really nice guy, Bob. I hope you're doing well today. So he ended up, I
don't know, I don't know how the conversation got started about vinegar, but he said that
he liked to drink, drink straight vinegar. And so my mom's like, what? You want to drink
straight vinegar? Here you go. Let me give you some. Okay, Bob, more power to you. Your
stomach is solid, man. You drank that vinegar and didn't even wince. I'm proud of you. Hi
Beth. Welcome back. I told another story about you. You didn't. I'm not sure you would just,
let me just get squared away here on my chair. And I thought you would behave yourself. You
remember a guy named Bob? Oh my gosh. Yes. Do you want to tell us about him? No. That's
okay. I already did. Well, mom used to say he had a kukuruku on his hair because of the
way it swayed. Was it like a cowlick? Yeah, bad one. Oh, Hey, I remember learning about
cowlicks. We used to have those little, oh, I don't know if they were talent shows or
whatever. They were up on the stage at the elementary school that we went to. And then
we'd all go in there like a, in auditorium and sit there and watch different things.
One guy played Benny and the Jets on his guitar. And some other guy gave us a speech on how
cowlicks occur or how cowlicks happen. He did. Yeah. That's how I learned a cow literally
comes up and licks you. And that's why your hair looks like that. The farmers out there
wouldn't be too happy with that story. Well, hopefully our listeners enjoyed the story
about Bob, because if you don't want to indulge, I will. We used to go fishing all the time.
You did. Did you catch anything? No, because we just went by some little creeks and there
really wasn't anything. I was such a tomboy back then. Oh yeah. Yeah. Those were the days,
right? Yeah. Okay. Let me see if I can pick up where we left off, but just know whenever
you drop, there will be another story to be told. Nothing to say. No. Oh, okay. Eventually
Melvo and Muhammad were arrested. And on October 24th of 2002, the FBI surrounded the suspect's
car and arrested both Muhammad and Melvo as they were taking a break off of I-70 in Maryland.
They were just taking a nap and apparently Melvo had night watch duty, but he fell asleep
because how old was he? 17? Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know why, um, Muhammad would have
put him in charge, but you know, I guess they took turns. Now a refrigerator repairman wrote
down that license plate number that I had mentioned and called the tip line from the
rest stop. So apparently the guys were sleeping in the car and he had enough gumption to take
down that number and call the police at the same time. And so the FBI were able to surround
them rather quickly. Oh good. Yeah. And now upon inspection of the 1990 Chevy Capri authorities
discovered a little small hole that was cut right outside of the car's license, like right
next to the license plate. So they had it set up, Melvo and Muhammad had it set up in
a way where they took the divider out from, um, between the back seat and the trunk. So
one of them, they didn't even have to get out of the car. All they did was probably
move the seat back. It looked normal. If you're coming up on them at a red light, it looked
like the back seat was normal, but all they had to do was remove that, that back seat.
And then there was nothing keeping them from just getting in the trunk and laying low.
And so what they would do is they would put the tip, the tip of the rifle. That's what
you call it. The muzzle. Is it the muzzle? I don't know. Okay. Why don't you know you
were in the army? They didn't teach you about the parts of a, of a gun? No. Oh, well I'm
sure they did, but you know what? I forget. Okay. So they were able to take the, um, I'm
going to call it the muzzle of the rifle that they were using. They basically just laid
low, got into position, stuck the muzzle out through the hole of the back of the car where
the trunk was at next to the license plate. And then, you know, they did their damage
from there. So when the authorities searched the car, they found a Bushmaster 223 rifle
that was used in the Montgomery, Alabama robbery, which was found in the vehicle here. And then
along with that, they found a rifle scope in a tripod that normally snipers are used
when they're training. Now, I don't know if Muhammad was actually trained to be a sniper
in the military, but he surely was pretty knowledgeable. He had a restraining order
against him by his ex-wife with all those proceedings, but because he committed federal
violations with having that rifle in his possession, when he was arrested, the authorities were
able to charge him with a weapons violation at the time, which got him off the streets
immediately. You know how sometimes they can get bail. Oh yeah. Yeah. So if he had a restraining
order against him, he was already in violation of that. Now they ended up going on trial
and were found guilty on all charges and Muhammad was sentenced to death. He was put to death
by lethal injection in November of 2009, but because Melva was a juvenile at the time,
he was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences without parole. And he's serving his sentences
at the Red Onion State Prison in Virginia. Now I am not condoning any of these actions,
but he seemed to have gotten a heart a little bit while he's been incarcerated. And he is
saying that while looking back on these incidents, Melvo came to the realization that Muhammad
was training him for a mission. Oh, interesting. Yeah. And that mission was to get Muhammad's
children back. You know, Melvin kind of fell right into that. He was tested and ended up
hurting somebody close to his ex-wife. And then of course he went on this little spree
across the States. However, in 2012, the Supreme court ruled that defendants who are under,
well, who were age 17 or younger should not be sentenced without the possibility of parole
without extenuating circumstances such as irreparable corruption. But Melvo has shown
remorse for his actions and publicly admitted that he himself is a monster. So just last
month in February of 2022, the Maryland Supreme court is reconsidering Melvo's sentences under
the circumstances that he was a minor when he committed his crimes. So he actually has
a possibility to come out on parole after he serves 20 years, which is pretty much any
day now because he's been in there since what, 2002? He's been incarcerated almost 20 years,
if not 20 years already. But of course, you know, you have to go through a bunch of red
tape to be able to be freed or released or whatever that is. But you know what the good
news is that I did not find about this story. What nobody hooked up through a dating website.
That's true. Anyway, that's the story of the beltway snipers. That was very interesting.
Yeah. I hate it for everybody who lost someone or even had to live with the terror of the
situation at the time. But you know, with technology and everything getting better these
days, then I'm glad they got them off the streets as quickly as they did. That hotline
really did seem to help. It reminded me of our podcast on Don't F with Cats, how the
public all rallied around and super sleuthed. I love that. Yeah, for sure. It just it takes
it takes a village, doesn't it? Yeah. Okay, so there you have it. Now. I don't know if
you have any closings for me today, Beth. No, I think you were going to give us a teachable
moment teachable moment. Go out to the field first if you're going to ride a dirt bike
and don't get overzealous because if you really don't know how to drive it and you're out
on the road, you're going to crash. So that's a wrap. And that's a wrap. But before we wrap,
I just wanted to tell everybody thanks for listening and please go to our website at
dying to be found calm. You can find all of our social media sites there and all of our
podcasts that you can listen to. So thanks for listening and we will talk to you next
time. Bye.