Word: shooters
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...killer's profile, but they have turned out to have alibis. One was a man known for belligerence and a fondness for firearms who was found to be sick and under constant care. Several other men remain under surveillance, but police still don't believe they have the shooter...
...first shooting that broke the killing pattern--flimsy as it was--came the next day in a parking lot in Spotsylvania County, Va. The shooter had deviated by about 70 miles from the epicenter of the other attacks, spurring speculation that he was rebelling against hypotheses that he must live in Montgomery County. The shooting also left the woman injured but alive. And it took place in front of another Michaels store. Desperate for a motive, police contacted Michaels headquarters in Texas for reports of disgruntled employees. But the return to a Michaels craft store may have been sheer coincidence...
...trooper parked just across the way, this time in Fredericksburg, Va., about 50 miles southwest of Washington. Police blocked off I95, stopping all northbound white vans in response to a witness report. Geraldo Rivera, stuck in traffic, began broadcasting live on Fox News from his cell phone. But the shooter slipped by once again...
...there's any consolation for horrified Americans watching the drama of the sniper slayings unfold, it's that now, more than ever in history, officials have the skills to catch so slippery a killer. Even as the shooter--or shooters--taunted investigators by picking off more victims last week, authorities unleashed an unprecedented arsenal of tools to crack the case: geographic-profiling computers to try to pinpoint the killer's home, ballistics databases intended to link his unique bullet markings to other crimes and trace-substance technology to lift whatever clues (fingerprints, DNA) might adhere to a shell casing...
...past, this was a surprisingly low-tech chore, involving melting a glob of paraffin in a pot and painting it onto the fingers and hands. The wax was then peeled off and treated with chemicals that react to gunpowder traces. If the chemicals turned up positive, you had your shooter--unless, of course, the chemicals were reacting with urine, bleach or fertilizer, which had a nasty habit of yielding identical results...