Through 13 days of testimony at U.S. District Court in Boston, the
jurors have heard witnesses ranging from people who lost limbs when
the twin pressure-cooker bombs ripped through the crowd at the
race's finish line to FBI agents who described finding fuses and
metal BB pellets in the apartment where the defendant and his older
brother lived.
Tsarnaev, 21, is accused of killing three people and injuring 264 in
the April 15, 2013, attack. He is also accused of shooting dead a
university police officer three days later as he and 26-year-old
Tamerlan Tsarnaev prepared to flee the city.
The two brothers took part in a heated gunfight with police in the
Boston suburb of Watertown, Massachusetts, that ended when Dzhokhar
roared off in a hijacked Mercedes SUV, running over his older
brother. Tamerlan later died of his injuries.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev briefly escaped, prompting a day-long lockdown of
most of the greater Boston area while police conducted a massive
manhunt. He was found hiding in a boat parked in a backyard late on
April 19, 2013.
Tsarnaev's lawyers opened the trial early this month with a blunt
admission that their client committed all the crimes of which he is
accused. Rather than trying to prove his innocence, they aim to
spare him the death sentence he could face by convincing the jury
that Tamerlan was the driving force behind the attacks.
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The same jury that determines whether Tsarnaev is guilty will decide
whether he is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of
parole, or death.The bombing killed restaurant manager Krystle
Campbell, 29, graduate student Lingzi Lu, 23, and 8-year-old Martin
Richard. Tsarnaev is also charged with the fatal shooting of
Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier
three days after the bombing.
(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Dan Grebler)
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