Slayings reportedly amused Malvo

CHESAPEAKE, Va. — A cocky Lee Boyd Malvo laughed repeatedly during a police interrogation as he recounted some of last year’s sniper attacks, saying of one victim, "He was hit good. Dead immediately," a detective testified at Malvo’s murder trial Friday.

Malvo is on trial for the Oct. 14, 2002, shooting death of FBI analyst Linda Franklin at a Home Depot.

Malvo, speaking confidently at times and rambling at others on an audiotape played in court, also said he and convicted sniper mastermind John Allen Muhammad selected targets in places with white vans nearby because they knew police and the public were on the lookout for such a vehicle.

And he said he and Muhammad even returned to some of the crime scenes to watch police at work.

"You did what we wanted you to do," Malvo, then 17, told a detective on the tape. "Once you locked onto a vehicle, we made sure that vehicle was there. Made sure we were around them. People are just going to lock onto them."

The conversation with Fairfax County homicide detective June Boyle began on the afternoon of Nov. 7, 2002, two weeks after Malvo and Muhammad were arrested at a rest stop in a dark blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice.

Malvo’s lawyers do not dispute that he took part in the sniper attacks, but they contend he was brainwashed by Muhammad and is innocent by reason of insanity.

In nearby Virginia Beach, jurors spent nearly four hours deliberating whether Muhammad should be put to death for orchestrating the sniper rampage. Then they asked what they should do if unable to reach a unanimous decision.

"We have spent six weeks. … I would simply urge you to continue your deliberations. We really want to try to get a unanimous decision," Circuit Judge LeRoy Millette Jr. told the jury.

If the jury cannot reach a unanimous decision on the death penalty, Muhammad will automatically receive life in prison. The jury is to return Monday.

Muhammad was convicted this week of two capital murder charges related to the Washington-area sniper attacks that killed 13 people and wounded three last year. The jury is deciding whether Muhammad should live or die for killing Dean Harold Meyers on Oct. 9, 2002, in Manassas.

Boyle testified that Malvo laughed when he described the Franklin and Meyers shootings. While talking about the shooting of a 13-year-old boy outside a middle school, Boyle asked, "Why shoot a child at all?" Malvo answered, "A phase."

Boyle said when she asked Malvo about the Meyers shooting, he again laughed and said, "He was hit good. Dead immediately."

On the tape, Malvo discussed Franklin’s slaying with a laugh, too, and said he shot her after she walked into "the zone."

Boyle asked Malvo if he knew where Franklin was hit by the bullet. "He laughed and pointed here, right here," Boyle said, pointing to the right side of her forehead.

Malvo said he couldn’t have done the shootings without Muhammad, who acted as his spotter. "It’s a team, a team, team, team," he said.