DC Sniper Lee Boyd Malvo's 4 Life Sentences To Be Revisited

NORFOLK, VA — Four life sentences for Lee Boyd Malvo, the convicted DC Sniper who is serving time at a supermax prison in Virginia, were thrown out Friday by a federal judge, because Malvo was 17 at the time he committed four murders in the Commonwealth. The ruling doesn't vacate the convictions against Malvo in a terrifying string of shootings 15 years ago, and it doesn't affect six life sentences he also must serve for deaths in Maryland.

The reconsideration ordered is based on the fact that Malvo was 17 years old when he and his partner, John Allen Muhammad, began their cross-country shooting spree that focused on the Washington metro.;

Instead, the courts in Fairfax and Spotsylvania must resentence Malvo, now 32, although he could still receive life sentences in the review. In 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that mandatory life sentences for juveniles convicted of murder are unconstitutional, a decision was retroactive, reports The Washington Post. That ruling sparked hearings across the country for young offenders.

Virginia does not offer parole to felons.

Prosecutors say the 2016 ruling doesn’t apply to Malvo. A hearing is set for June 15 in Montgomery County Circuit Court, reports WTOP.

Muhammad was executed by lethal injection in November 2009. Malvo was convicted of six murders in Montgomery County and is serving a life sentence without parole.

Over 21 days in October 2002, the pair shot 13 strangers, killing 10 of them, in the Washington, DC, area, including in gas stations and parking lots. As the manhunt drug on, The Washington Post says sporting events were canceled, tarps who put up to hide customers as they filled their cars at gas stations. After the two were caught, they were tied to at least 11 more shootings — five of which were fatal — from Washington state to Alabama.

In April, Malvo's attorney argued in Montgomery County court that the killer's punishment is unconstitutional. Montgomery County prosecutor John McCarthy says Malvo’s life sentences in Maryland were not mandatory. “Under the plea agreement, the court had the discretion to impose any sentence authorized by the first-degree murder statute,” including parole, McCarthy wrote in court documents.

On Oct. 2, 2002, the horrific case that killed ten people began when the duo shot through a window at a Michael's crafts store in Aspen Hill. Nobody was injured there, but later that day a man was fatally shot in the parking lot of Shoppers Food Warehouse in Wheaton. Four victims are shot and killed while at gas stations in Aspen Hill, Kensington, Manassas and Fredericksburg. One victim was walking along Georgia Avenue in The District when he is gunned down.

Only one of the attacks was in Prince George's County, outside of Benjamin Tasker Middle School in Bowie. The youngest victim of the sniper attacks, then 13-year-old Bowie resident Iran Brown, was shot on Oct. 7, 2002, when he arrived at the Bowie school to begin classes for the day. Though Brown's injuries required multiple surgeries, he survived the shootings to testify at Muhammad's trial.

The perpetrators, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, were regulars at the YMCA of Silver Spring in the weeks before their killing spree. The pair was arrested Oct. 24, 2002.

Years later, Malvo told TODAY’s Matt Lauer that he was sexually abused by Muhammad, the mastermind behind the sniper attacks, for two years before the shootings began.

The Washington Post has published a rare new interview with Malvo in which he describes himself as a "monster."
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