'Oh My God, I've Been Shot'

Victim Tells Muhammad Jury About Attack Near Va. Steakhouse

Jeffrey Hopper said he ducked at first. The sound thundering across the parking lot outside a steakhouse in Virginia in October 2002 could have passed for an exploding car, he said, and he expected parts to fall from the sky.

Then, Hopper told a jury yesterday in Montgomery County, "I looked down and realized my hand was on my abdomen, and I turned to Stephanie" -- his wife -- "and said, 'Oh my God, I've been shot.' "

Hopper's dramatic testimony came on the fifth day of evidence in the Maryland trial of John Allen Muhammad. Hopper, a Florida resident passing through the area on Oct. 19, 2002, said he and his wife were concerned enough about the sniper attacks to wait until they reached Ashland, just north of Richmond, before stopping for dinner.

He told the jury that as he bled on the ground, "I told Stephanie I loved her," and the couple prayed together.

Muhammad, who is representing himself, did not visibly react as Hopper, now 42, described his injuries: a punctured lung, pierced kidney and liver, damaged pancreas and stomach. When it was his turn, Muhammad declined to question Hopper.

Muhammad is charged only with the six slayings in Montgomery, but prosecutors are presenting evidence related to other shootings linked to the attacks, such as Hopper's.

Muhammad, 45, has been sentenced to die in Virginia for one of the sniper murders. Lee Boyd Malvo, his younger accomplice, has been sentenced to life in that state. Malvo, now 21, is discussing a possible plea with Maryland prosecutors and could appear as a state's witness at Muhammad's trial, sources have said.

In the woods near the Ponderosa Steakhouse in Ashland, after the 12th sniper shooting in the region, investigators discovered a now-famous note indicating that the attacks were part of an elaborate extortion scheme. The note -- handwritten and rife with grammatical errors -- demanded that $10 million be placed in a bank account from which the killers could later make unlimited withdrawals.

It concluded with a haunting postscript: "Your children are not safe anywhere at any time."

Also yesterday, jurors listed to a recording of Ted Franklin wailing and sobbing as he told a 911 operator that his wife had been shot at a Home Depot in Fairfax County. Linda Franklin, 47, an FBI analyst, died at the scene on Oct. 14, 2002.

"She's shot in the head," cried Ted Franklin, a former Marine. "Oh my God."