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At the end of that summer, though, Washington police somehow retrieved the children, and Mildred gained custody. She had not heard from them for more than a year, according to court filings. A Pierce County, Wash., court cut off all Muhammad's visitation rights.
The loss decimated Muhammad, says J. Mills, his lawyer from the custody dispute. Through what Mills terms "very sophisticated legal maneuvering," Mildred allegedly won custody without Muhammad's knowledge. "The system could do nothing to help John. He banged his head against the wall for three months with no success," says Mills. Eventually, after two custody hearings had to be canceled because Mildred could not be located, Mills says, Muhammad gave up. "That happens a lot. If the frustration level is high enough, some turn to violence."
At this crucial moment, just when Muhammad had lost his family, Malvo reappeared. Lee Malvo was born in Kingston, Jamaica, on Feb. 18, 1985, according to Jamaican documents. His father, Leslie Samuel Malvo, and half-brother, Rohan Malvo, who still live there, have appeared before the media, baffled and teary, to confirm that the boy did live there. But he left when he was 13. Rohan told reporters that his brother wasn't a bad or violent person. But he conceded to TIME that he hadn't seen his half-sibling in years: "It's been such a long time."
After Malvo left Jamaica, he and his mother may have gone to Antigua, though their exact route remains unclear. By August 2001, they were both living illegally in Fort Myers, Fla. After a short time, though, Malvo left his mother to live with Muhammad in Washington State. Starting in October 2001, Malvo and Muhammad slept on adjacent bunks at the Light House Mission, a shelter for the homeless in Bellingham. And Malvo briefly enrolled in school. Stacey Gugich, 18, a student at Whatcom Community College, was a classmate at Bellingham High School. She remembers a "really friendly guy" who was generous with his compliments. She also recalls that when the class worked on a essay about the Vietnam War, Malvo "seemed to know all the technical terms and strategies. He seemed to know what he was talking about when it came to warfare. He said his dad was in the Gulf War."
But in December Malvo's mother took a bus from Florida to Bellingham to find her son, says a Bellingham police spokesman, Detective Lieut. Dac Jamison. She asked the police for help. Simultaneously, the high school asked the police about Malvo's missing records, and the department referred the case to the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Muhammad and Malvo were briefly detained as illegal immigrants, then released to await a hearing. Malvo, however, continued to be seen at Muhammad's side around Bellingham.
Light House Mission resident manager Jerry Page says he became close to Muhammad around this period. "We used to sit and talk for hours about the Bible and the Muslim religion," says Page. "He said that he believed in [the Prophet] Muhammad and that everything we do on this earth has a cause and effect and also has an effect on other people." When he lost custody of his children, he put on a stoic face, Page says. "He said it wasn't meant for him to have them right now, and when the time came, the Lord would deliver them to him."