MANASSAS (Reuters) — A judge sentenced John Muhammad to death on Tuesday for one of 10 sniper-style murders that terrorized the Washington area in 2002, and set Oct. 14 as the execution date.

As expected, Judge LeRoy Millette confirmed last November’s guilty verdict and death sentence by a jury and brushed aside Muhammad’s appeal, which argued last month that his conviction was based on guesswork and emotion, rather than facts and law.

“These offenses were so vile, they were almost beyond comprehension,” Millette said.

Before the sentence was passed, Muhammad again insisted he was innocent of the crimes that brought a reign of fear over the U.S. capital area, when victims were shot at random as they walked to school, mowed grass or waited at bus stops.

“I don’t stand before you today trying to make any excuses,” Muhammad said. “I had nothing to do with this.”

Millette set Muhammad’s execution date for Oct. 14, but that date will likely change as the case now moves through the automatic appeals process, beginning with the Virginia Supreme Court.

The former Gulf War veteran was sentenced by a Virginia Beach jury for killing Dean Meyers, a 53-year-old Maryland man, who was shot as he refueled his car in Manassas, Virginia. The trial had been moved to Virginia Beach, some 200 miles away, to avoid a prejudiced jury.

Muhammad’s accomplice Lee Malvo, who was 17 at the time of the killings, faces his sentencing hearing on Wednesday, when a judge will decide whether to confirm the jury’s recommendation of life in prison. Malvo had originally faced a possible death sentence.

Muhammad’s defense argued that for most of his life, the 43-year-old was a successful soldier, businessman and father and deserved life imprisonment rather than the death penalty.

“He is not the devil,” defense attorney Jonathan Shapiro told Millette.

The prosecution countered that Muhammad would pose a risk to prison guards if allowed to serve out a life term and the death penalty would be a deterrent to others.

Referring to Muhammad’s surviving victims and relatives of those killed, attorney Paul Ebert said, “These folks in this courtroom and others deserve some closure.”