Sniper

RENO -- A family court judge was shot and wounded as he stood near a third-floor courthouse window yesterday, and police sealed off the area and searched nearby parking garages for a sniper. Chuck Weller, 53, was hit in the chest around midday by a shot or shots that came through his office window at the Mills B. Lane Justice Center, authorities said. He was taken by ambulance to a hospital, where he was reported in serious condition. "He is conscious and talking with his family," police spokesman Steve Frady said.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told the Marine Corps yesterday to reinvestigate and take appropriate action against the Marine snipers who posed with a logo resembling a notorious Nazi symbol. The top Marine officer apologized for the incident and ordered his commanders to look into the use of such symbols by snipers and reconnaissance Marines and make sure they are educated on how inappropriate such actions are. The rapid-fire announcements came on the heels of demands from a leading Jewish organization and others for President Obama to order an...

ST. JOHN'S, Newfoundland - Icebergs, some bigger than the world's largest cruise ships, meander silently by the harbor here in late spring and early summer. Michael Ryder grew up in a fishing town to the north, Bonavista, roughly a four-hour drive, depending on the ploddings of the too-frequent interlopers with large antlers that have a way of fascinating visitors and ticking off the locals. "Moose," grumbled Ryder, the newest Bruin, who returns to his beloved province for a few weeks every summer.

In "The Flowers of War," when a lone Chinese sniper blows up himself and a pack of Japanese soldiers, the blast sends dust, debris, and fabric flying through the air. It's not that you notice the colors of the fabric - they're like fireworks. It's that you notice that you've noticed. The comely images in this movie - and there are many of them - call attention to themselves, as do most of the images in most movies by Zhang Yimou, - from "Ju Dou" to "The House of Flying Daggers.

RICHMOND, Va. - Before John Allen Muhammad went to trial for orchestrating the deadly sniper rampage that terrorized the Washington, D.C., region, he claimed he was a prophet and that his teenage accomplice had concocted an herbal AIDS cure, his lawyers say. Despite such grandiose statements and evidence that Muhammad's brain was damaged by childhood beatings, his trial counsel failed to stop Muhammad from acting as his own attorney for part...

BAGHDAD - A military panel acquitted US Army Specialist Jorge G. Sandoval of two counts of murder yesterday, apparently swayed by testimony from fellow Army snipers that two Iraqi men were killed on orders from a higher-ranking soldier. Sandoval was convicted of a less serious charge of planting detonation wire on one of the bodies to make it look like the victim was an insurgent. As a result, he still could face five years in prison. The seven-member jury deliberated less than two hours in clearing him of all but one charge.

MOUNTAIN HOME, Idaho - If Marion Lewis had his way, he’d take Washington, D.C.-area sniper John Allen Muhammad into the Idaho desert near his home and kill him slowly over three days. “He would be screaming the whole time. That’s why I can’t claim to be a good Christian,’’ said Lewis, whose 25-year-old daughter was killed in Maryland in the 2002 shootings. But instead of personal retribution, Lewis would settle for being present in the Virginia death chamber Nov. 10 when Muhammad is scheduled to be executed.

SEYMOUR, Ind. -- Sniper attacks targeted two pickup trucks early yesterday on a busy highway, killing one person and wounding a second, and police asked other motorists who had been through the area to check their vehicles for bullet holes. Hours later, two more vehicles were struck by bullets on another four-lane highway about 100 miles away, but there was no immediate indication whether the two cases were connected, police said. One shot struck a southbound pickup on Interstate 65 shortly after midnight, killing one of its two passengers, police said.

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. -- A policeman spoke to sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad just a half-hour after the shooting for which he is on trial, but let him go as the officer tried to deal with angry, panicked drivers trying to leave the scene, a jury at Muhammad's murder trial was told yesterday. Prince William County Police Officer Steven Bailey testified that Muhammad was "very polite and very courteous" when they spoke as Muhammad drove his Chevrolet Caprice out of a restaurant parking lot from where police believe the snipers fired the shot that...

ROCKVILLE, Md. -- In an often testy four-hour cross-examination, John Allen Muhammad questioned the mental health and memory of his former sniper protégé Lee Boyd Malvo. Muhammad, defending himself against murder charges in six Maryland killings, tried to counter Malvo's damaging testimony Tuesday that he sought to spread terror in the Washington region in 2002. Muhammad, already sentenced to death in a Virginia murder, pointed to Malvo's trial in Virginia, in which Malvo pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity and received a life sentence.

Nick Francona, son of former Sox skipper Terry Francona and wife Jacque, was in Dorchester this week speaking to kids at Mother Caroline Academy. A lieutenant in the Marine Corps, Francona recently returned from Afghanistan, where he served as a sniper. While deployed in the war zone, his unit received cards from Mother Caroline students.

GUVECCI, Turkey — Syrian forces backed by snipers and tanks stormed into the border town of Khirbet al-Jouz yesterday, sending hundreds of refugees fleeing to Turkey from the informal camp where they had sought shelter from a violent crackdown on protests in the country’s rural northwest. Since violence erupted in northwestern Idlib Province this month, thousands had found shelter in shabby tent cities scattered across the rugged frontier. In recent weeks, many refugees had come to think of the densely forested valley around...

Snipers are targeting children in the besieged rebel-held Libyan city of Misrata, the U.N.’ s children agency said Friday. Hundreds of residents have been killed and wounded in the assault by Gadhafi’s forces on Libya’s third-largest city, and residents are running short of water, food and medicine. “What we have are reliable and consistent reports of children being among the people targeted by snipers in Misrata,’’ UNICEF spokeswoman Marixie Mercado told reporters in Geneva.

SANA, Yemen — Snipers hidden on rooftops fired methodically on Yemeni protesters chanting peace slogans yesterday as police sealed off a key escape route with a wall of burning tires. The massive antigovernment demonstration ended in chaos and calls for retribution, with at least 47 people dead and scores wounded. For more than 20 minutes, witnesses said, security forces and government supporters fired directly at protesters near Sana University. Most of the wounds were to the head, neck, and chest, doctors at the scene said, indicative of an intent to kill.

CAIRO — Moammar Khadafy’s forces fired on mourners leaving a funeral for protesters yesterday in the eastern city of Benghazi, Libya, killing at least 15 people and wounding scores more, as the regime tried to squelch calls for an end to the ruler’s 42-year grip on power. The deaths pushed the overall estimated death toll to 99 in five days of unprecedented protests. Libyan protesters were back on the street yesterday, but Khadafy has taken a hard line toward the dissent that has ripped through the Middle East and swept him up...

RICHMOND - The Supreme Court refused yesterday to block the execution of Beltway sniper John Allen Muhammad, who coordinated the 2002 shooting spree that left 10 dead in the Washington region. Muhammad, 41, is to be executed by lethal injection tonight. As the execution nears, echoes of the three weeks in which millions of people were on edge are reverberating throughout the region. Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor objected to the speed with which the court acted, saying it “highlights once again the perversity of...

In "The Flowers of War," when a lone Chinese sniper blows up himself and a pack of Japanese soldiers, the blast sends dust, debris, and fabric flying through the air. It's not that you notice the colors of the fabric - they're like fireworks. It's that you notice that you've noticed. The comely images in this movie - and there are many of them - call attention to themselves, as do most of the images in most movies by Zhang Yimou, - from "Ju Dou" to "The House of Flying Daggers.

Nick Francona, son of former Sox skipper Terry Francona and wife Jacque, was in Dorchester this week speaking to kids at Mother Caroline Academy. A lieutenant in the Marine Corps, Francona recently returned from Afghanistan, where he served as a sniper. While deployed in the war zone, his unit received cards from Mother Caroline students.

MOUNTAIN HOME, Idaho - If Marion Lewis had his way, he’d take Washington, D.C.-area sniper John Allen Muhammad into the Idaho desert near his home and kill him slowly over three days. “He would be screaming the whole time. That’s why I can’t claim to be a good Christian,’’ said Lewis, whose 25-year-old daughter was killed in Maryland in the 2002 shootings. But instead of personal retribution, Lewis would settle for being present in the Virginia death chamber Nov. 10 when Muhammad is scheduled to be executed.

RICHMOND, Va. - Before John Allen Muhammad went to trial for orchestrating the deadly sniper rampage that terrorized the Washington, D.C., region, he claimed he was a prophet and that his teenage accomplice had concocted an herbal AIDS cure, his lawyers say. Despite such grandiose statements and evidence that Muhammad's brain was damaged by childhood beatings, his trial counsel failed to stop Muhammad from acting as his own attorney for part...