T H E E X A M I N ER8 SU N DAY, NOV E M BER 8 , 2009
LOCAL NEWS
O
ne of the more memorable
moments in my coverage
of crime in the nation's
capital took place in 1993,
when relatives, friends and politi-
cians came to the playground of
Weatherless Elementary School
to bemoan the death of Launice
Smith.
A four-year-old, Launice was
running on the school playground
a few days earlier when a teenager
showed up with a gun in his hand
and revenge on his mind. He shot
and killed his rival, Kervin Brown.
But in the hail of bullets from his 9
mm pistol, he shot Launice in the
head. She died four days later.
Delores Smith, one of Launice's
aunts, spoke at the gathering. A
former D.C. cop, she bemoaned the
violence that had made the streets
run with blood. She looked at then-
Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly and said:
"I have to opportunity to ask
you: heat up the electric chair.
Bring it back. If you bring back
capital punishment, it will cut
down on some of this killing. It's not
right to say a life for a life. I know.
`Thou shalt not kill.'
But some of these animals?" she
asked. "You need to replug that elec-
tric chair over there at D.C. jail and
start frying some of them and make
it public."
Delores Smith raised her hand
up, as if she could plug it in herself.
"And then," she said, "they'll
stop."
I was reminded of Launice Smith
and her Aunt Delores when I read
that attorneys for sniper John Allen
Muhammad last week asked the U.S.
Supreme Court to halt their client's
execution. Muhammad, you will
recall, was the mastermind behind
the shooting spree that left 10 people
dead and terrified the Washington
region for weeks in the fall of 2002.
Barring intervention by Virginia
Governor Tim Kaine or the Supreme
Court, Muhammad is scheduled to
die by lethal injection on Tuesday.
The appeal to Kaine seems to have
failed.
Muhammad's current lawyers
said he was paranoid and delusional
during his trial in Virginia Beach
in 2003. He represented himself,
against the appeals of his court-
appointed lawyers, Peter Greenspun
and Jonathan Shapiro. His lawyers
now argue that Greenspun and Sha-
piro failed to force Muhammad to let
them represent him.
Muhammad's new lawyers say he
suffers from mental illness because
of brain damage caused partly by
childhood beatings. What they do
not argue is that Muhammad was
impaired during the random shoot-
ings when he directed his young
accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, to kill
and maim innocents like Dean Mey-
ers, gunned down at a gas station
near Manassas. They don't mention
that Muhammad earned an Expert
Rifleman's Badge in the Army and
served in the Gulf War. Or than he
was smart enough to run a credit
card fraud scam in 1999.
This is a tough call, but I am with
Delores Smith. There's justice and
there's catharsis due the people who
loved the 10 who died in Muham-
mad's shooting spree.
E-mail Harry Jaffe at
hjaffe@washingtonexaminer.com
Should sniper John Allen Muhammad die on Tuesday?
Name: Examiner House Ads; Width: 22p9.6;
Depth: 7 in; Color: Black plus three; File Name:
143114-0; Comment: BALTIMORE SUB-LEASE
AD; Zone: PCaa
Name: Cyprus Air Heating & Cooling; Width: 34p8.4; Depth: 10 in; Color:
Black plus three; File Name: 144635-0; Comment: WINTER BLOWOUT; Zone:
DCVA
Harry
Jaffe

Page 1Page 2Page 3Page 4Page 5Page 6Page 7Page 8Page 9Page 10Page 11Page 12Page 13Page 14Page 15Page 16Page 17Page 18Page 19Page 20Page 21Page 22Page 23Page 24Page 25Page 26Page 27Page 28Page 29Page 30Page 31Page 32Page 33Page 34Page 35Page 36Page 37Page 38Page 39Page 40Page 41Page 42Page 43Page 44Page 45Page 46Page 47Page 48Page 49Page 50Page 51Page 52Page 53Page 54Page 55Page 56 Produced by PageSuite