Two D.C.-area sniper victims had ties to Webster

By Rose Hooper

James Martin, 55, of Silver Spring, Md., the first victim, killed on Oct. 2, visited Webster the first week of August.

"He was the husband of my daughter Ann (Mellish)'s best friend, Billie. They were neighbors in Silver Spring," said Louise Bedford of Webster.

"They came down and vacationed the first week of August in Maggie Valley with Ann and visited at my house," said Bedford, who had also met the Martins on a recent visit to Silver Spring.

Martin, a program analyst with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, had helped secure used federal computers for special needs students at Shepherd Elementary School in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

"He was just a fine man," Bedford said of Martin, who was a Boy Scout leader, school volunteer, church trustee and father of an 11-year-old son.

On the last day of his life Martin had stopped at Shoppers Food Warehouse in Wheaton, Md., to pick up food for a church potluck supper. He was killed at 5:20 p.m. by a single bullet to the chest.

"Jim was just in the wrong place at the wrong time," said Bedford, who shopped at that same grocery store when visiting her daughter.

The sniper's second victim, also a James ­ James L. "Sonny" Buchanan ­ was a former student of Webster resident Joe Rhinehart.

Buchanan, who had his own landscaping company, was killed 7:41 a.m. Oct. 3 while mowing grass at Fitzgerald Auto Mall in White Flint, Md.

"I taught Sonny English at Gaithersburg Junior High School in Maryland," said Rhinehart.

"It was 1976 and he was in my third period English class. I still remember exactly where he sat," Rhinehart said about Buchanan, whom he recalled as a "good student."

Through his landscaping company, Buchanan employed under-privileged teenagers and helped raise funds for the county's Boys and Girls Club. He also owned a Christmas tree farm with his father, James, who is retired from the Montgomery County Police Force. Rhinehart's former student was a member of the local Crime Solvers organization.

"Think of the irony there," said Rhinehart, who was further amazed at how the two victims, both killed in busy metropolitan areas, had ties to the town of Webster.

In addition to Martin and Buchanan, seven people have been shot to death and two others wounded in shootings attributed to the sniper.

Back to Archive: 10/17/02.