Teenager Malvo found guilty of Washington sniper killings

A jury has convicted 18-year-old Lee Boyd Malvo in the Washington sniper killings, leaving the teenager open to a death sentence.

Malvo was found guilty on Thursday after 13 hours of deliberations on the charges of capital murder, terrorism and illegal weapons use.

He was only 17 when the 10 killings over three weeks in October last year terrified the Washington region. The sniper's bullets also injured three people.

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His accomplice John Allen Muhammed was found guilty last month and a sentenced to death by a jury. A judge is to formally sentence Muhammed in February.

Malvo was accused in the sample case of the killing of FBI analyst Linda Franklin on October 14, 2002. A single shot in the head killed Franklin, 47, as she loaded purchases into her car at a shopping centre in Falls Church, Virginia.

The defence had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. Malvo's lawyers said he had been brainwashed by Muhammed, a 42-year-old Gulf war veteran who befriended the young immigrant from Jamaica and taught him how to shoot.

Prosecutors rejected the insanity defence and have called for the death penalty.

Muhammed and Malvo were detained two days after the final killing in the spree. They were asleep in a car that police said had been specially fitted out to be used for sniper shootings. The back of the car had a hole through which a rifle could be fired.

Agencies