US: The race to try and potentially to execute the two men held as suspects in the sniper shootings around the greater Washington area intensifies today when charges are introduced in a Virginia court.
Mr John Allen Muhammed and his teenage companion, Mr John Lee Malvo, will be charged with two shootings in Spotsylvania county where one man was killed after being hit by a bullet in the head while pumping petrol and a woman was shot in the back while putting shopping in her car.
The two men were charged with six other counts of first-degree murder in Montgomery county, Maryland, on Friday. The race to charge both suspects with capital offences caused some disquiet on television discussion programmes because Mr Malvo is aged 17, too young to be executed in some states.
Yesterday, the Virginia attorney general, Mr Jerry Kilgore, said his state would be the best venue for a first trial as it would try both as adults. Maryland does not allow the death penalty to be imposed on minors.
"I think it's important that we all get together and decide which jurisdiction can proceed quickly, which jurisdiction can get the most out of this," Mr Kilgore said, "and all indications point to Virginia."
The case against the two men is being swiftly prepared. At the weekend, FBI agents in Flint, Michigan, arrested Mr Nathaniel Osbourne, who co-owned the blue Chevrolet that had been outfitted as a killing machine.
The police in Alabama have also widened their search for suspects in an off-licence shooting - the first killing linked to the pair - and say there may have been a third person involved. - (Guardian service)