CrimLaw

Sniper: Malvo:

found here

(1) The Defense called an expert on brainwashing to testify at the end of last week. The prosecution objected:

Friday’s testimony centered on indoctrination, despite Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Robert F. Horan Jr.’s assertion that it was “a red herring” in a case with an insanity defense.

Horan objected repeatedly to questions about whether Malvo’s frequent moves, restricted diet or lack of a father figure could have contributed to his indoctrination by Muhammad.

Such hypothetical questions “must give the full picture of a life,” Horan said, not just pick and choose details.

Eventually, Martin was allowed to answer a question by defense attorney Thomas B. Walsh, who asked if Malvo’s nomadic existence would “be consistent with the condition that would facilitate someone being indoctrinated.”
. . .
Horan continued to object, stating that the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition “never, never, never defines indoctrination as a mental disease.”

The reference manual calls indoctrination “a dissociative disorder not otherwise specified,” Horan read. Malvo laid his head on his arms, folded on the table, and watched as the attorneys debated during a 30-minute jury recess.

Walsh explained that Martin was there not to address Malvo’s background but to testify from his professional knowledge and “simply set the stage” for later expert testimony. Fairfax County Circuit Judge Jane Marum Roush then permitted Martin to answer Walsh’s questions.

When allowed to testify, the expert's testimony was in the form of general information rather than direct application to Malvo:

Martin, who testified that he was a lieutenant in a religious cult in the early 1970s, said that there are a series of techniques cults or individuals use to indoctrinate people. Typically, he said, they have a dogma or ideology, and a system for teaching that ideology.

Cults also attack the person's past belief system, Martin said. "In other words, out with the old and in with the new."

Cults usually place some sort of demand on people they are indoctrinating, Martin said, whether it be enduring lectures, watching videotapes, or engaging in exercise and meditation.

Martin, who according to The Associated Press has not interviewed either Malvo or Muhammad, also said cults promote a fear of leaving a group, and create additional incentives -- in the form of extra sleep or food, for example -- for remaining in the group.

Martin said people have a common misconception that most indoctrinated people are isolated from society. "It's a misnomer to think that everything about these situations is like a concentration camp," he said.

And, he said, there can be one-on-one indoctrination of the sort defense attorneys say happened with Muhammad and Malvo.

(2) A couple of former FBI profilers discuss the possible motives of the shootings:

[I]t is far from clear whether the snipers had extortion in mind when they started killing.

They did not even suggest they wanted money until a vague reference to "negotiations" in a phone call to police on Oct. 15, the day after the 11th shooting - the murder of Linda Franklin at a Home Depot store in Fairfax County, for which Malvo is now on trial.

They did not get around to demanding the $10 million until four days later, after wounding a man outside a restaurant in Ashland. An entry in their laptop computer showed they had considered demanding $5 million.

The snipers wanted the money placed in a bank account from which they could withdraw it through ATMs anytime, anywhere in the world. Even Muhammad must have realized how far-fetched that was, said Robert K. Ressler, a former FBI profiler who has interviewed numerous serial killers. He said the snipers probably thought up the extortion plan in the middle of the killings as an excuse to taunt and challenge the police.

If money had been the snipers' motive, Fox said, "it would have been easier for them to rob a bank."

"Some people just like to kill other people," said Gregg McCrary, another former FBI profiler. "They try to rationalize the murders afterward, but it might not be any more complicated than that."

(3) The Voice of America discusses the brainwashing defense:

"Juries are fundamentally reluctant to accept the notion that humans are so pliable, that human will can be bent in that way," he said. Sociologist James Richardson teaches at the National Judicial College, a training center for judges at the University of Nevada at Reno. He says the brainwashing defense has been tried unsuccessfully in high-profile cases like the 1976 trial of newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst. She was kidnapped by armed revolutionaries but - toting a machine gun - later joined them in robbing a California bank. Unmoved by her defense of indoctrination, a jury found her guilty. Mr. Richardson says that although jurors are often sympathetic to the emotional pressure put on malleable suspects by conniving accomplices, they return to a premise of American justice, that people are responsible for their own actions.

(4) The Guardian sums up the Defense so far.

(5) Another article which discusses that pictures:

One drawing depicts a naked black man hanging in a public square from chains around his wrists. Nearby, a slave takes orders from his master. A caption says: "THIS IS WAR. IT WILL GO ON AND ON UNTIL YOU ARE TOTALLY DESTROY, YOUR WHITE STATE OF MIND . . . HOLY WAR! JIHAD."

Another shows the Star of David in the crosshairs of a gun scope, with the declaration, "WANTED DEAD! True Terrorists. Fight to destroy oppression," written next to the image. And in another, a sniper lies in tall grass setting his rifle sights on a target: "NO PEACE! ONLY PIECES. You got lucky boyz! (Great job). No suppressor! YOU WILL NEVER BE SAFE!"

(6) An article about Muhammad and Malvo buying doughnuts.