Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, a college student who along with his brother planted twin bombs near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, was on Friday sentenced to death for his role in the 2013 attacks, the worst terrorist assault on American soil since September 11. It took the jury 14 hours to reach the decision. Tsarnaev was found guilty on all 30 charges in the bombing and its aftermath. The jury decided in favour of death penalty, despite a sharp division in the State on death penalty.
“The ultimate penalty is a fitting punishment for this horrific crime and we hope that the completion of this prosecution will bring some measure of closure to the victims and their families,” Attorney General loretta E lynch said after the announcement of the death penalty. In reaching its decision, the jury found that Tsarnaev had shown no remorse for his actions, and it rejected the defence argument that his older brother, Tamerlan, a self-radicalised jehadi, had brainwashed him into joining in the bombings.
The death sentence for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev sets the stage for what could be the United States’ first execution of a terrorist in the post-9/11 era, though the case is likely to go through years of legal appeals. It was the first time a federal jury had sentenced a terrorist to death in the post-September 11 era, according to Kevin McNally, director of the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project, which coordinates the defence in capital punishment cases.
Tsarnaev stood, his hands folded in front of him, as the jurors made their way out of the courtroom. Three people were killed and 264 others wounded in the twin blasts. His father, Anzor Tsarnaev, reached by phone in the southern Russian region of Dagestan, let out a deep moan upon hearing the news and hung up. The decison brought some relief in Boston. “We can breathe again,” said Karen Brassard, who suffered shrapnel wounds on her legs.