John Allen Muhammad, the D.C. Sniper, will die by lethal injection tomorrow.
John Allen Muhammad and his teenaged accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, terrorized the Washington, D.C. area for three weeks in October 2002. In the end, 10 people were dead and three were wounded. The victims, selected at random, were shot while doing mundane chores like pumping gas and loading Halloween decorations into a car.
I’m sure you remember the terror of the killings. But you may not realize that the killing spree was an escalation of a child custody battle.
Psychological abuse
Mildred Muhammad, the ex-wife of John Allen Muhammad, spoke at the Battered Mothers Custody Conference in Albany last January. Her story was compelling—and heartbreaking.
Mildred was married to Muhammad for 12 years, and they had three children together. Muhammad served in the Gulf War and when he returned, he became abusive.
“His behavior turned to possessiveness,” Mildred said. “I couldn’t do anything right. He was trained in psychological warfare—he was a combat engineer—and he used me as his guinea pig.”
Muhammad didn’t hit her, but inflicted psychological abuse. “Every emotion I displayed, he used against me,” Mildred said. Finally, in 1999, she asked for a divorce.
Kidnapped children
Before, during and after their divorce, Muhammad threatened to kill Mildred. He drained their bank account and kidnapped the children, taking them to Antigua for 18 months. Mildred was forced to hide in a women’s shelter for eight months in the Tacoma, Washington area.
She could not afford legal representation. So while in the women’s shelter, Mildred taught herself the law so she could represent herself. Eventually the children were located. Mildred went to court, won her case and was awarded full custody. Then she fled across the country to Maryland.
Muhammad found her. And, Mildred says, that’s why he went on the killing spree. Muhammad planned to kill her, and the rest of the murders were an elaborate ruse to cover up her murder. She would just be another of the random victims, and he could show up as the grieving ex-husband, and claim the children.
Want to win
When John Allen Muhammad was brought to trial, the prosecutor put forth Mildred’s contention that the killing spree was intended cover up the eventual death of his ex-wife. The court, however, ruled that there was insufficient evidence to support the argument.
But after all the stories I’ve heard from Lovefraud readers, I think it’s totally plausible. Sociopaths want to win. Nothing else matters to them. I believe John Allen Muhammad was willing to kill 10 innocent people, at random, just to get his way.
If ever there was a case that demonstrated the lengths a sociopath will go to in order to win, this is it.
No conscience
According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Muhammad’s lawyers filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court last week, claiming that the killer is mentally ill and delusional.
But Paul Ebert, the Virginia prosecutor who won Muhammad’s death sentence, said, “This guy had absolutely no conscience. He killed people just like they were flies.”
Mildred also does not believe that her ex-husband is mentally ill.
Support for other victims
Mildred has written a book about her ordeal called Scared Silent. She has also founded an organization in Maryland to support survivors of domestic violence called After the Trauma.
“I started After the Trauma because of my own personal domestic violence experience and thought of all the other women in similar situations who need day-to-day assistance, as I did,” Mildred writes on her website. “After the Trauma is women who are transitioning from a domestic violence situation and are ready to take the next step into ”˜freedom.’”
Like many of us here at Lovefraud, Mildred Muhammad has been through an incredible ordeal. And like many of us, she emerged on the other side stronger, and willing to help others along the path to healing.
Kathy, btw, I DID want to call you “mom” but I decided it would be best not to. Throughout my life, I’ve noticed that sometimes the close bonds between some people will make others feel left out because they are new or haven’t made friends within a group yet. So, I’m trying to refrain from making anyone feel that way in whatever situation I find myself. I want everyone, old and new, to feel equal, if at all possible. I’m not sure I’ve expressed what I mean very well, I hope so. Just know that I do feel like you are my cyber/spiritual mom, but I’m going to call you Kathy.
Skylar, how in the world did you find out he is a pedophile? Are you going to turn him in? Do you know specific children he has hurt? This is a pretty horrible revelation.
Sky, I think I understand. Getting our child-self to trust us can be a major issue.
The simple answer, or so I hear from other people, is just to ask it, “What is it going to take for your to trust me?”
Which, I guess, is equivalent to asking ourselves what is it going to take for me to trust me?
I had something really interesting happen during my recovery. I’ve written about it before, but not lately. I was on a business trip in London, and got gluten’d at a restaurant dinner. (I had more trouble in England getting restaurant people to get the concept of a gluten-free diet than anywhere else I travelled.) Gluten really affects my brain chemicals fast, and I went to sleep feeling anxious and weepy.
As I was waking up the next morning, I was in a dream. I was deep underground. It was exactly like an underground cave I visited in Belize with a black river running through it. But in the dream I knew that river was bitterness. (Something I wasn’t allowed to feel, because I didn’t want my incest background to “ruin me.”) I stood looking at it, wondering if I dared to stick a toe in it, or if I should just run away and not look back.
Before I could decide, this long ribbon of black started to move and rise up like a being. It reminded me of a cloaked and hooded monk. I couldn’t see its face. And then I woke up in my hotel room with sunlight piercing the curtains to illuminate the yellow walls.
I felt queasy and hungover from the gluten, but I knew in that spectacular London morning that the bitterness I had been suppressing was the wisdom of my memories. I could almost feel that dark entity taking its place behind my left shoulder to whisper warnings and guidance based on what I had already lived through. And that I could depend on it to be the self-defensive factor in my life that I’d never had.
This was long before I really hit my angry phase. I was still trying to sort out whether or not I had reason to classify my ex as a bad person, so that I could stop feeling like I had continue to be protective or concerned about him. In my life, I’d never recognized anyone before as a bad person. I’d always understood everything, or tried to. So this was a big hurdle for me to overcome.
And maybe the dark guardian helped me get there, to make that decision that my ex didn’t deserve to be cared about. I do know that its presence, and the permission it gave me to feel my bitterness and anger, and to learn from my history, was the beginning of learning to trust myself, instead of seeking “strong” partners to protect me. Later when I really released my anger and started consciously building better boundaries and developing my self-defensive skills, I was answering the concerns of my child self with concrete steps to protect us both.
What I found I really wanted and needed was to become my own authority. To not just trust myself to take care of me, but to trust my own vision and to be able to accept the possibility that I would make mistakes on the way to getting things right. Imaging that I had to be perfect was a symptom of not experiencing what it was like to experience life in a normal human way — because in my family it was way too risky to have feelings, make mistakes or think about anything but keeping the monsters at bay.
This is how I talk to myself…
This is how I look at things. I may be wrong or missing something, but based on what I can see and what I feel, this is my best truth for right now. I know I’m evolving, so tomorrow’s truth may be a little smarter, a little more profound or comprehensive than today’s. But I’m working right now with the best I have, and I have to trust that it’s leading me to the next thing I need to know. I believe in my inner wisdom more than I believe in anything else, because I believe that it’s also part of the God spark in me.
I hope this makes sense.
And I know what you mean about the mom thing. I’ve had a lot of wonderful mentors in my life, some of whom are long-dead writers and teachers. If there is a blooming in you that you don’t quite own yet, I’m glad to be your avatar of growth for as long as I serve.
Namaste.
Kathy
Kathleen,
Blimey! I love reading your posts, but like I said before my booty does tend to become numb after sitting for too long.
When’s the book coming out?…;P
Also, I am one of those cheerleader types who heaps genuine praise upon people who endear, touch, affect me.
I won’t stop doing it either. No way, No how. Can’t make me. It’s an inherent part of my nature, feeds my soul and it just feels too GOOD to witness lovely smiles/giggles/beaming faces created by my sincerity.
Hey, just the way I roll!!
Peace and Love and Joy to every single beautiful, wonderful, extraordinary human being on LF.
Haha…how’s that?
🙂
JaneSmith, you make me feel like a puppy getting a tummy rub.
Oops, you can’t make me feel anything. I am responsible for my own feelings.
Well then, JaneSmith, Namaste. My inner tummy-rubbed puppy lolls contentedly at the feet of your inner cheerleader.
Now, I have to leave, and cook dinner for my pups and me.
LOL and awwww, Kathleen
You had to do it, didn’t ya? Mention puppies, kitties, butterflies, rainbows, bunny rabbits, unicorns and dragons and I go bonkers! (ok, the last 2 aren’t real. Or are they? hmm)
And you better believe it, lovely lady. I CAN cause you to feel a tad bit of joy and delight. I’m a force of nature, ya know. No one can escape me when I’m practically exploding with happiness and vitality.
Got’s ta share it! It’s a duty and a purpose!
What’s the point in being confident, serene and joyful if I can’t share and spread these sublime feelings with an unsuspecting public?…haha.
GOTCHA!!
🙂
xxooxxooxx…
thanks Kathleen. I think I always sought out strong partners, because I didn’t feel strong myself. I always sought out strong personalities……I was very attracted to men who were confident, who knew who they were, and above all, were independant. I was never attracted to someone who liked me Too much. That’s so sad, isn’t it? No wonder I got what I got!
Today, I don’t want anybody. That’s just where I am. I would still probably like the same type, and it’s pointless.
About the horse with the swirl that’s not quite right….Love it.
Reminds me of that crazy look in their eyes, but more.
They say that the seat of all intuition is the third eye, and it resides in that place, between our two eyes, but slightly above. Right where that swirl would be…..So, if a predator were sizing one up……looking into one’s soul, so to speak, for weakness, wouldn’t his swirl be off…..and couldn’t we, as intuitive beings, see it? It’s a metephore for listening to your gut. I’m gonna be paying attention to the swirl.
Dear Star,
Murphy was an OPTIMIST! “anything that can go wrong, WILL go wrong at the WORST possible time.”
Ther are long lists of additions to Murphy’s law(s)—but I tell you they are all TRUE. I swear to you they are!
I tried BOINKING the clouds back when we had all those days of days of weeks of months of rain this summer (almost double the normal amount of rain for this area) but it didn’t work. The only thing that the skillet can keep in line is Henry, ,my two sons, and a few of the rest of LF folks, so I guess maybe it is my fault about the weather, I just don’t know how to use the skillet correctly. LOL
Oxy, I beg your pardon? You are the skillet eficionado around here. Do I hear self-doubt creeping in? Oh no. I will not have it. Your boink is the most effective boink I know of.
As far as the weather goes, well, it can be tempermental, and your best to just work on acceptance. That is one thing I learned from my childhood in Seattle, no amount of boinking was gonna stop the rain. (((hugs)))
Oxy, LOL!! You may just need a new, improved skillet. Nowadays, skillets can that text, take pictures, do your dishes, and boink clouds! It’s snowing like crazy right now. I want to go out and have fun. I’m dying to go dancing. But I don’t want to drive in this mess.
Is it normal to find a therapist I really like and then a week later just lose interest and feel like I’m going through the motions talking to her? I’ve become soooo self sufficient….I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. I was sitting in her office the other day, and all I could think of was that I’d rather be dancing. And yet the week before, I felt like I really needed to be there. I just didn’t feel like talking this week. Is this normal? Or is it something else? I’m starting to wonder if I’m just too far along down the solitary path for any kind of long-term therapy.