An old Army buddy of sniper suspect John Muhammad recalled on Friday how his friend had test-fired a Bushmaster rifle and praised his alleged accomplice Lee Malvo as being a "good shot."

 Muhammad, a 42-year-old Gulf War veteran, is on trial on two capital murder charges stemming from a sniper-style shooting spree that gripped the Washington, D.C., area last year. Malvo, 18, goes on trial in a separate case in the same shooting series on Monday.

 Robert Holmes, who served in the US Army with Muhammad, said Muhammad tested a silencer on a Bushmaster rifle at Holmes' home in Tacoma in the state of Washington in 2002, months before the shootings began around the US capital.

 Prosecutors have entered a Bushmaster rifle into evidence in Muhammad's trial, identifying it as the murder weapon.

 "He was outside," Holmes testified. "Lee (Malvo) and myself stayed inside the house. ... He was testing a silencer."

 Holmes also said Muhammad and Malvo talked of going to a firing range. "He told me Lee was a good shot," Holmes said.

 Holmes said the sniper suspects stayed with him three or four times during the six months leading up to last October's string of sniper shootings.

 He recalled that Muhammad was upset about losing custody of his three children to his second ex-wife, Mildred, and Muhammad saying he had determined she and the children were living in the Washington, D.C., area.

 Holmes said he asked Muhammad if he was planning to harm his ex-wife, and Muhammad told him he wasn't.

 Prosecutors theorize Muhammad might have planned to kill Mildred Muhammad and make her death appear random, letting him regain custody of the children. Mildred Muhammad was not harmed.

 Holmes said he called the FBI on Oct. 15, 2002, the morning after the sniper-style shooting death of FBI analyst Linda Franklin, after seeing a TV report on the type of rifle used in the attack that also said a team of shooters might be responsible.

 He said the FBI interviewed him about a week later. The suspects were arrested on Oct. 24, 2002.

 Also on Friday, jurors inspected the blue Chevrolet Caprice prosecutors maintain the suspects converted into a sniper's nest. Jurors got a look at the car in a secure parking area inside the jail where Muhammad is being held.

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