Bio

Dawud Majid Mu’Min was born David Michael Allen on May 19, 1953. He was known as an American offender later known by the name Dawud Majid Mu’Min after he converted to Islam while incarcerated. Before the case that led to his execution, he had already been convicted of a serious violent crime in Virginia.

On February 27, 1973, Allen killed Charles Shupe, a 43-year-old taxi driver, in Grayson County, Virginia. Reports identify the method in that case as shooting. He was convicted of first-degree murder and grand larceny and received a 48-year prison sentence. While serving that sentence, he changed his name to Dawud Majid Mu’Min.

By 1988, Mu’Min was incarcerated at Haymarket Correctional Unit and assigned to an outside work crew connected to the Virginia Department of Transportation. The work detail placed him outside prison walls under limited supervision. This assignment later became central to public criticism of Virginia’s inmate labor policies after Mu’Min used the work detail to leave custody and commit another killing.

Murder Story

On September 22, 1988, Dawud Majid Mu’Min was serving his 48-year sentence when he was assigned to a Virginia Department of Transportation work crew in Dale City, Virginia. During a lunch break, he left the work site. The Supreme Court of Virginia record states that he was one of several inmates transported to a VDOT work location that day.

Mu’Min walked to the Ashdale Plaza Shopping Center and entered a flooring and carpet business operated by Gladys Nopwasky. Nopwasky was alone inside the store. Prosecutors said Mu’Min attacked her, knocked her down, and killed her. Reporting on the execution states that she was beaten and stabbed, and that four dollars were taken from a desk drawer near her body.

Court and case summaries identify the killing as a capital murder committed while Mu’Min was a prisoner and during the commission of other felony conduct. The indictment included grounds connected to his custody status, robbery while armed with a deadly weapon, and rape. The jury found him guilty of capital murder, and the trial court imposed a death sentence.

The case received major attention in Virginia because Mu’Min had been allowed to work outside prison despite already serving a long sentence for murder. After the killing, Virginia changed its outside inmate work policies, limiting such assignments to lower-risk inmates and requiring stronger supervision.

Mu’Min appealed his conviction and sentence. His case reached the United States Supreme Court as Mu’Min v. Virginia, where the Court reviewed issues involving jury selection and pretrial publicity. On May 30, 1991, the Supreme Court held that the trial judge’s refusal to ask prospective jurors detailed questions about the specific contents of news reports they had seen did not violate Mu’Min’s constitutional rights.

On November 13, 1997, Dawud Majid Mu’Min was executed by lethal injection at Greensville Correctional Center in Virginia. He was pronounced dead at 9:41 p.m.