JOHN Lee Malvo, the 17 year-old arrested in connection with the Washington sniper killings, is almost certain to have been a Jamaican boy said to have been abandoned by his mother in Antigua and “adopted” by the man suspected of being the shooter.

“Malvo was a Jamaican boy abandoned by his mother and adopted on the streets by (John Allen) Muhammad while he lived in Antigua,” said Julian Rogers, the head of news and programming at Observer Radio in the Antiguan capital of St John’s. “He lived here with Muhammad and Muhammad’s three children.”

Last night the Jamaican foreign ministry confirmed that a youngster named Lee Boyd Malvo had emigrated to “another Caribbean island” in 1998, at the age of 13, which would make him the same age as the boy who has been at the centre of one of America’s most sensational crimes and manhunts ever.

Lee Boyd Malvo, Jamaican birth records show, was born in Kingston on the 18th of February, 1985 to Una James of St Elizabeth. His father, Leslie Samuel Malvo, was added to the record in 1990.

“Local school records show no evidence of disruptive behaviour and point to the attainment of an academic standard that was satisfactory,” the foreign ministry said.

Officials last night declined to name the school which Malvo attended or the area where it is located.

Last night the Associated Press quoted Leslie Malvo as expressing surprise about the developments surrounding his son, whom he has not seen since age 13.

“This morning I woke up and heard the news and I said, ‘That sounds like my son’,” said Malvo, 55, a building contractor. “He was a nice kid so I don’t know how he got mixed up in this.”

Malvo was interviewed near his home in the Kingston neighbourhood of Waltham Park Road.

Bishop Choyes Codner of Bethel Born Again Church of God on Oakland Road, also in Waltham Park, yesterday recalled a woman in the area named Una James, who emigrated more than a decade ago, but he had questions whether it was the same woman.

The Una Thomas of Codner’s memory was in her late 30s or 40s, and he did not recall her having a young child.

“That woman would now be in her 50s or 60s,” Codner told the Observer. “If she had a child who is now 17 that child would have been an infant and I never saw her with a young child.”

Malvo and Muhammad, 41, a US army veteran, were arrested early yesterday morning in a car at a rest stop 50 miles northwest of Washington, DC, an area that has been gripped in fear from three weeks of sniping by a shadowy gunman who left 10 people dead.

Among those killed was a Jamaican-born bus driver, Conrad Johnson, 35, who was shot early Tuesday morning as he stood on the step of his bus in a neighbourhood in Montgomery County, Maryland.

It was unclear last night what were the circumstances under which Malvo went to Antigua or Muhammad’s precise connection with the eastern Caribbean island. There were suggestions, though, that Muhammad, who served with the US forces in the Gulf War, was born in the United States to an Antiguan mother.

Muhammad was apparently called John Allen Williams before he converted to Islam and changed his surname. Sources in Antigua last night quoted government officials as saying a person named John Allen Williams has an Antiguan social security number, but this could not be immediately confirmed.

Reporters in Antigua said yesterday that Muhammad lived on the island between 1999 and 2000, apparently having gone there with his three children — Selena, John and Taliba — after the break-up of his marriage.

He at first lived in the village of English Harbour, on the island’s south, near to Nelson’s Dock Yard, one of the Caribbean’s premier yachting centres.

Muhammad later moved to Rose Street in a community called Ottos, just outside the capital. Muhammad’s three natural children, people in the area said yesterday, attended the Granville Primary School in the community.

Malvo attended the Seventh-day Adventist School. There were no indications of how he performed at school.

The whereabouts of Muhammad’s children were unclear last night and no one was certain what were his movements after he left Antigua sometime in 2000. But Antiguans who saw Muhammad’s face on cable television claimed to have seen him on the island in recent months.

Samuir Doumith, who manages Antigua Home Office Depot, on Old Parham Road, just outside St John’s, believed he saw Muhammad in his store as recently as two months ago.

“He asked about rattan furniture,” Doumith was quoted as saying.

Employees of one local bank recall him doing business at their branch, but said there was nothing suspicious about him.

Muhammad and Malvo appeared in court yesterday and were ordered detained in custody. Neither has been charged with the shootings, but law enforcement sources said that investigators were certain they had cracked the case.

One source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a gun found in the suspects’ car appeared to use .223-calibre bullets — the fatal calling card in the attacks that began October 2 with the killing of James D Martin in a grocery store parking lot in Wheaton, Maryland.

The weapon found in the Chevrolet Caprice was a Bushmaster rifle, according to a law enforcement source.

The AR-15 is the civilian form of the M-16 military assault rifle. As a soldier, Muhammad received a Marksmanship Badge with expert rating — the highest of three ratings — in use of the M-16, according to US Army records. Police also found a scope and tripod in the car, the official said.

In handcuffs and a green prison jumpsuit, Muhammad was ordered held without bail when he appeared in federal court in Baltimore. The courthouse was patrolled by a dozen federal marshals armed with high-powered rifles.

Muhammad is due back in court Tuesday on a federal firearms charge stemming from a 2000 court order in Tacoma, Washington, that barred Muhammad from harassing or using force against an ex-wife and children.

US District Court Magistrate Beth P Gesner made no mention of the sniper killings. Muhammad spoke little during the 10-minute hearing. When Gesner asked him if he understood the charge, he quietly answered, “Yes, ma’am”.

Malvo is considered by the court to be a juvenile, and all of his proceedings are closed.

The suspects, it seems, might have been tripped up by their own arrogance; authorities said they received a call on the task force tip line taking responsibility for the sniper attacks and for an incident in Montgomery, Alabama.

Evidence from a September 21 robbery attempt outside a liquor store in Montgomery, which killed one employee and wounded another, then led police to Malvo and Muhammad.

Investigators haven’t ruled out other accomplices, including some who may have provided vehicles or other support.

But who were these two, and why might they have unleashed terror on Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia?

Muhammad and Malvo are said to have been known to speak sympathetically about the hijackers who attacked the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon in September 2001, but were not linked to bin Laden’s terrorist cells.

Muhammad did not receive sniper training during his Army career. Muhammad had training in three areas, mainly as a combat engineer, which was his specialty during the time he served in the 1991 Gulf War.

He was also trained as a metal worker and a water transport specialist.

Muhammad enlisted in the Army on November 6, 1985, and was discharged at Fort Lewis on April 26, 1994. After leaving active duty he served in the Oregon National Guard until 1995. Before coming on active duty, he served in the Louisiana National Guard from 1978 to 1985.