Relief was the first emotion to be expressed
by newspapers across the US at the arrests of two suspects in the sniper
shootings, which have terrorised the nation's capital and its suburbs.
But
close on its heels were comments about the vulnerability of every community and
every person in the country, which was highlighted by the killing spree.
The Washington Post entitled its editorial simply: "A nightmare
ends."
Its
home communities were those targeted in the shootings which killed 10 people
and injured three more and though the newspaper urged its readers not to forget
the victims and their families, it said most people would want to return to
normal as quickly as possible.
There
would be "the chill reminder of vulnerability", the editorial warned.
"But
it doesn't lessen the joy of being able at last to tell the kids that it looks
as if this is a story in which the good guys have won in the end."
The front page of The Washington Times announced: "Thank God, it's over."
But
it said the sniper attacks highlighted how precarious people's physical safety
was.
The
11 September attacks showed the "struggle" that the US was involved
with and the sniper attacks were "an object lesson" that anyone could
be targeted.
"Fortunately,
it seems that old-fashioned detective work overturned the rock that Mr Muhammad
and his youthful aide-de-camp were hiding under," it added.
Though
refusing to criticise police, The Sun did note that the suspects apparently
dropped bigger and bigger hints to investigators until they were "finally
able to connect the dots".
"What
if he had been a true political terrorist, determined to remain uncaught?"
it asked.
In
the other Montgomery - in Alabama - the Montgomery
Advertiser was proud to proclaim: "Montgomery evidence helps crack
sniper case."
A single fingerprint found at the scene of
liquor store murder now linked to the sniper suspects could have been crucial,
it said.
Montgomery
Mayor Bobby Bright was quoted as saying that after the fingerprint was received
by the sniper task force; "their case took off".
The
suspects - John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo - were also known in the
Pacific coast state of Washington, where The
Seattle Times profiled them as "A controlling man, a teen who
followed".
The News Tribune in Tacoma where Mr Muhammad
lived during and after his army career said while the chief victims were those
who were shot, the attacks - if shown to be the work of Mr Muhammad - would
also hurt the image of the US army and American Muslims.
They
would also shame the city of Tacoma, adding to its history of serial murders.
"Americans
who know nothing else of Tacoma can remember Ted Bundy, the Trang Dai killings
- and now John Muhammad," it said.
A report in Baton Rouge's The Advocate noted wryly that police
should have looked for the sniper in that city, given its current run of
notorious misfortune which includes "a serial killer, an outbreak of West
Nile virus, a possible link to last year's anthrax attack, the imprisonment of
former Governor Edwin Edwards, a tropical storm and a hurricane, and a native
who allegedly was a member of the Taleban".
How
do YOU think the American Sniper should be punished?
Mark
Bell