5 Years After Sniper Attacks, Malvo Says He's Sorry

IT STARTED AS AN UNEXPLAINED SHOOTING at a Michael's arts and crafts store in Aspen Hill on the evening of Oct. 2, 2002. Then later that night came another shooting, this one fatal, nearby at a Shoppers Food Warehouse. Then, five years ago this morning, four more people were shot within the span of two hours in Montgomery County, the news soon spread and a national crime drama played out through the month of October. Checkpoints were set up on the Capital Beltway and other highways. Children were kept indoors during recess. Confusion prevailed as fear gripped the region.

Although the District mainly escaped the crosshairs of the convicted sniper suspects John Allen Mohammed and Lee Boyd Malvo — there was no telling who could be a target. This writer remembers well the scene at Albemarle Street NW and Fort Drive in Tenleytown where people waiting for the traditionally off-schedule M4 bus were pacing back in forth in formation at the bus stop, trying to avoid being a sitting target for any evildoers waiting to strike at us from white box trucks, which police said were vehicles of interest. Of course, the white box truck alerts turned out top be nothing but a hysterical fear.

Now, five years later, one of the shooters is trying to make amends. The Post's Ernesto Londono reports that Malvo, who is in prison without the possibility of parole, recently called up the daughter of a sniper victim in Arizona, a call arranged through an ABC News producer. "I just wanted to apologize to you," he told her. "I am so sorry for what I've done."

» "Malvo Offers an Apology By Phone" [WaPo]

File photos from 2002 by The Washington Post's Dayna Smith and Robert A. Reeder