Tacoma shootings tied to sniper suspects

The handgun that killed a 21-year-old Tacoma woman in February has been tied to sniper suspects John Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, Tacoma's police chief said last night.

The men also have been linked to a May shooting at Temple Beth El, Tacoma's only synagogue, Police Chief David Brame said.

Tacoma detectives had been baffled by the Feb. 16 slaying of Keenya Cook, shot once in the head by a .45-caliber slug as she answered the door at her aunt's home.

The breakthrough in the case came Thursday, when a friend of Muhammad's who is a fellow gun enthusiast told the FBI that the two sniper suspects had access to his gun collection.

The man, whom police haven't identified, told detectives Muhammad, 41, and Malvo, 17, stayed off and on at his Tacoma home from February to April, then moved in from May to July.

The man owned two rifles and three handguns. One weapon was a .44-Magnum handgun. Another was a .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun.

The state crime lab tested the man's weapons over the weekend.

"We now consider John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo as suspects in the Keenya Cook homicide," Brame said.

The two guns were not used in the Alabama liquor-store slaying on Sept. 21 or in this month's D.C.-area sniper attacks that killed 10 and injured three, police said.

Cook was diapering her 6-month-old daughter when she opened the door of her aunt's Tacoma home and was killed with a single shot to the head by a .45-caliber slug.

She had been living at Isa Nichols' home to escape an abusive boyfriend.

Police now think Nichols, 42, was the intended target. She was a bookkeeper for Muhammad's unsuccessful mechanic's service and had sided with his second ex-wife, Mildred Muhammad, during a bitter divorce and child-custody battle.

When Mildred and John Muhammad split up in March 2000, he ran off with their three children. Nichols helped Mildred and police try to track down Muhammad and the children.

Last night, Isa Nichols' husband, Joseph, said his wife was "shocked" to learn she was the likely target. "She is pretty devastated."

Joseph Nichols, a staff sergeant at Fort Lewis, said the family has "a feeling of relief. We're looking for answers, and that's what we're headed for now."

Brame, the police chief, said he has assigned a team of detectives to investigate the slaying.

The state crime lab matched slugs from a .44-caliber Magnum handgun with the shooting at the Temple Beth El.

At night during the first weekend in May, someone fired shots from a .44-caliber Magnum at a door of the unoccupied synagogue, police said. The rounds penetrated the door and several walls.

Rabbi Mark S. Glickman said he would give more details at a news conference today.

Glickman said his temple members had thought the May shooting was simple vandalism. "It was very surprising," he said last night when learning the gunfire had been tied to the sniper slayings.

Police said they had no motive for the temple shooting.

But after Sept. 11, 2001, Muhammad and Malvo made anti-American statements to neighbors and expressed sympathy with the Islamic extremists who carried out the terrorist attacks, law-enforcement sources said.

Police said they didn't know if the two rifles and the third handgun owned by the Tacoma gun enthusiast were used in other crimes.

The police chief asked people who knew of other crimes committed with similar weapons to call the Tacoma/Pierce County Crime Stoppers at 253-591-5959, or the FBI sniper tip line, 888-607-1569.

Waiting for DNA test

Investigators are waiting for results of tests of a small amount of DNA found on a shell cartridge recovered in Cook's killing. It is being compared to Muhammad's DNA, said Barbara Cory-Boulet, a senior Pierce County prosecutor.

The Cook slaying remained without a suspect until the Nichols family saw Muhammad's picture on television after his arrest in the sniper case, a Tacoma police spokesman said.

Isa Nichols told detectives about the falling-out with Muhammad over the divorce and child-custody issues.

Joseph Nichols said his wife had helped lead authorities to Muhammad.

Muhammad was caught with his children in Bellingham in August 2001 when he applied for state aid. A state fraud investigator cross-checked his name with a report of missing children and reported Muhammad to the Whatcom County Sheriff's Office.

A sheriff's detective pulled the children out of school, served papers on Muhammad and arranged for the children to be returned to their mother. The role Isa Nichols played in recovering the children remains unclear.

Nichols told Tacoma police this week that she had worked for Muhammad for about two years as the bookkeeper for Express Car/Truck Mechanic Service, a business he had incorporated in 1995.

On Feb. 16, Nichols "left to go shopping, came home and found (Cook) laying inside the front door," said John Reisch, a medical investigator with the Pierce County Medical Examiner's Office.

Joseph Nichols earlier said he was stunned when he saw Muhammad's photograph on television after his arrest in the sniper case. He knew Muhammad as a quiet Army veteran and strict father.

"I just didn't think John was capable of that," Nichols said.

Seattle Times staff reporter Christine Willmsen contributed to this report.

Mike Carter: 206-464-3706 or mcarter@seattletimes.com. Steve Miletich: 206-464-3302 or smiletich@seattletimes.com.