Ex-wife of D.C. sniper gives discussion on book

Says not all victims of violence have scars

Friday, Nov. 6, 2009

On Tuesday, Nov. 10, the person she feared the most, the convicted "D.C. Sniper," John Muhammed will be put to death in Virginia, and Mildred Muhammed believes that it is due to "divine intervention" that she is alive today.

When she appeared at the Calvert Library Prince Frederick on Tuesday evening to promote her new book "Scared Silent," published by Simon and Schuster-imprint Strebor Books International of Largo, Mildred Muhammed said that she is part of the 80 percent of domestic violence victims who do not have scars.

Instead of physically abusing her, she said that her former husband kidnapped their children, took them to Antigua and upon their return told her that he would kill her in a way that could never be traced back to him.

Mildred Muhammed said that she believes her ex-husband killed 10 people and injured another three in the 2002 Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C., sniper attacks as a "smoke-screen" that would allow him to murder her in the same, seemingly random manner that all the D.C. sniper's victims were slain.

She said that this would allow her ex-husband to play the role of "the grieving father" and seek full custody of their children.

"I knew John was going to kill me; I knew it was going to be a headshot; I knew it would be from a distance," she said, continuing that she remembered watching a movie with John, during which he said he was capable of "terrorizing a city" and making it look like it was being done by a group.

John Muhammed did not act alone in 2002; he had an accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, who Mildred Muhammed said met her ex-husband in Antigua.

"John brought Lee into my children's lives and said ‘this is your big brother,' so I was dealing with my children's father and their best friend," she said of Malvo, who is currently serving a life-sentence for his role in the slayings.

Mildred Muhammed said her ex-husband once sent Malvo to her home where the boy was supposed to shoot her in the face when she opened the door. Instead, she said he turned around and left.

When the police first came to her in 2002 and named the man to whom she was married for 12 years as a suspect in the sniper attacks, they told Mildred Muhammed that they believed she was the target after being tipped off by a friend of John Muhammed's.

The police asked her if she thought John Muhammed was capable of committing such a crime.

"Yes," Mildred Muhammed answered, remembering him saying, "You have become my enemy and as my enemy, I will kill you."

Mildred Muhammed believes she became her ex-husband's enemy not only by having social services have their kids returned to her but also because of the manner in which she left him.

"When I told John I was done, I was done," she said, continuing that she told him that there was nothing he could do or say to change his mind.

Today, Mildred Muhammed says that all women who are the victims of physical, physiological or verbal assault need to take this same stance the second the first assault occurs.

"Unfortunately, we only concentrate on the physical [abuse] … if I don't have any scars, listen to what I'm saying," she said, adding that if a person is in any type of abusive relationship, it is essential to "document, document, document."

She also told Tuesday's audience that, "Everybody wants to know that the first response given is one of help."

Mildred Muhammed, who has since remarried, now lives in Prince George's County, where she and her husband continue to home-counsel her children.

She said that while the children have not visited their father in prison, he is hardly an off-limits topic in her household.

"Good, bad, indifferent; I am the best resource for you to know about your dad," she said she told her children.

Mildred Muhammed also said that the public should not expect to see any emotion from John Muhammed leading up to his execution, first because he doesn't want anyone to be able to read him, and secondly, because he does not see himself as at fault.

"He does not take responsibility for any of his actions," she said, continuing that her ex-husband would only say, "It's Mildred's fault" to the police.

Calvert County Commissioner Susan Shaw (R) and Pat Pease of the Calvert County Crisis Center each provided a brief introduction to Mildred Muhammed.

Shaw mentioned a particularly personal instance of domestic violence causing her to lose a young family member.

"It crosses income barriers, racial barriers," said Shaw, who, agreeing with Mildred Muhammed, said that men can also be domestic violence victims.

Pease said that a good deal of her center's focus will go toward teenagers and dating violence.

"This is where it starts … what we are trying to do is get information into the schools and talk about healthy relationships," she said.

A portion of the proceeds from "Scared Silent" will go toward Muhammed's foundation, "After the Trauma," which was set up to support domestic violence victims.

lbuck@somdnews.com