Jury sentences marathon bomber Tsarnaev to death

World Today

Dzhokhar TsarnaevFILE – This undated file photo provided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation shows Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, charged in the Boston Marathon bombing. (AP Photo/FBI, File)

The jury deliberating the fate of Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev sentenced him to death by lethal injection on Friday.

CCTV America’s Nick Harper, who is inside the courtroom, reported that no jurors looked at Tsarnaev and that after the verdict was read the courtroom was silent. He said Tsarnaev swallowed hard, and his attorney asked that jurors be polled one by one.

The decision in the penalty phase of Tsarnaev’s trial came after just over 14 hours of deliberations. It was set to read out at the top of the hour.

Tsarnaev was convicted last month of all 30 federal charges against him, 17 of which carried the possibility of the death penalty.

CCTV America’s Roee Ruttenberg filed this report from Washington.
Follow Roee Ruttenberg on Twitter @RoeeRuttenberg

Three people were killed and more than 260 were injured when two pressure-cooker bombs packed with shrapnel exploded near the marathon finish line on April 15, 2013. Tsarnaev and his older brother, Tamerlan, also killed a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer days later.

Tsarnaev’s lawyer, Judy Clarke, admitted from the beginning that he participated in the bombings, bluntly telling jurors in her opening statement: “It was him.”

But the defense sought to show that most of the blame for the attack fell on his radicalized older brother, who wanted to punish the U.S. for its actions in Muslim countries. They said Dzhokhar was an impressionable 19-year-old who fell under the influence of a brother he admired.

Prosecutors portrayed Tsarnaev as an equal partner in the attack, saying he was so heartless he put a bomb behind a group of children, killing an 8-year-old boy.

Story compiled with information from CCTV America and the Associated Press


Criminal defense attorney Troy Slaten talks the Tsarnaev sentence

CCTV America’s Elaine Reyes interviewed Troy Slaten, a criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor, for more insight into the Tsarnaev Sentence.