|
 Tsarnaev, 21, is accused of setting off a pair of homemade
pressure-cooker bombs at the race's finish line on April 15, 2013,
along with his older brother, Tamerlan. He faces a 30-count federal
indictment that also includes charges of fatally shooting a police
officer three days later and hurling pipe bombs during a shootout
with authorities in a residential neighborhood.
Jurors spent just over seven hours evaluating Tsarnaev’s guilt on
the first day of deliberations on Tuesday.
The deliberations mark the first time that jurors are permitted to
discuss the trial's 16 days of testimony. U.S. District Judge George
O'Toole had earlier warned them not discuss the trial with anyone
while proceedings were ongoing, "including yourself in the mirror."
 Jurors are still barred from talking about the case outside the
deliberation room.
If they find Tsarnaev guilty, the same jury will hear a second round
of evidence before determining whether to sentence him to death or
to life in prison without possibility of parole.
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In a sign they were squarely focused on that question, defense
lawyers have bluntly admitted that their client committed the crimes
of which he stands accused, but contending he did so at the bidding
of Tamerlan, 26, who died following the gunfight with police in
Watertown, Massachusetts.
Prosecutors laid out evidence that the defendant, an ethnic Chechen
who immigrated from Russia a decade before the attack, had read and
listened to jihadist materials, and wrote a note in the boat where
he was found hiding suggesting the bombing was an act of retribution
for U.S. military campaigns in Muslim-dominated countries.
(Editing by Scott Malone and Jonathan Oatis)
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