In closing statements of the trial of suspected Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Monday, the prosecution and the defense summarized evidence put forth by nearly 100 witnesses over the past month of litigation.
U.S. District Judge George O’Toole began the morning’s court proceedings by individually and specifically outlining all 30 counts for which the 21-year-old defendant is being charged. These include, but are not limited to, three counts of conspiracy, conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, conspiracy to bomb a place of public use and conspiracy to maliciously destroy property. The prosecution then had the opportunity to make its final statements to the jury.
In closing statements, prosecution said Tsarnaev brothers “were in this together”
“He wanted to terrorize this country. He wanted to punish America for what it was doing to his people. So that’s what he did,” said prosecutor Aloke Chakravarty. “The defendant and his brother did this together. He planted one bomb. His brother planted the other.”
Chakravarty and the prosecution aimed to depict Tsarnaev as a Muslim extremist, a jihadist who had a pre-determined plan to kill and injure as many Americans as possible. They aimed to prove that the brothers had worked together as a team.
“In the end, they had murdered four people, maimed 17 and injured hundreds of others,” he said.
After re-reading the message the defendant had allegedly scribed in witness David Henneberry’s winterized boat, Chakravarty argued that Tsarnaev’s actions in the Boston Marathon bombings on April 15, 2013 were both well thought-out and intentional.
“He wanted his actions to stand for more than what people might think. He wanted to tell the world what he did and why he did it,” Chakravarty said. “He wanted to take credit. He wanted to justify it.”
Chakravarty summarized multiple witness testimonies and re-played video surveillance from the day of the bombings, focusing specifically on footage and photos of the now-deceased Krystle Marie Campbell, Lingzi Lu and Martin Richard.
“He thought his cause was more important than the people around him. He chose this place because it would cause massive damage,” Chakravarty said while showing the jury video surveillance of the defendant’s placement of the second pressure cooker bomb near the Marathon finish line on Boylston Street.
The footage included a video recorded by a pedestrian seconds after the explosions, which depicted the scene — men and women placing tourniquets on the injured, who were screaming, crying and bleeding. Chakravarty showed photos of the Richard family, whom he said had frantically been trying to find help for Jane Richard, Martin Richard’s 6-year-old sister who lost her leg in the explosion.
Chakravarty recalled Bill Richard’s statement from his testimony given on March 5.
Richard had told the jury, “I guess we were just unlucky that day.”
But this was no trick of fate, Chakravarty said. “This was a cold, calculated, terrorist act … their [the Richards’] path happened to cross the defendant’s that day. And the defendant made them pay. He was there to punish,” he said, pointing to the defendant.
The prosecution then introduced a brand new video montage, compiled of photos of both the defendant and bloody images from the scene of the bombings. The video was backed with a track from the jihadist CD that the defendant had allegedly played during the alleged carjacking.
Chakravarty went through a detailed recount of the events that took place after the bombings, including the defendant’s choice to go to Whole Foods to purchase milk just hours after the bombings, the carjacking of Dun Meng’s Mercedes and the murder of Massachusetts Institute of Technology Police Officer Sean Collier.
He argued that because the defendant joined his older brother Tamerlan at the front of the Honda Civic they had recovered after the police had begun to track the location of the Mercedes, the two “were in this together.”
Chakravarty said whether or not the defendant pulled the trigger, he still “devastated the lives of the people who survived.”
The prosecution stated finally that the defendant had lived the double life of a terrorist — one of a normal teenager, as well as one in his own bedroom, where he “descended into violent jihad extremism.”
Defense argues Dzhokhar was influenced by older brother Tamerlan
“We have come face to face with tragedy, suffering and grief,” said defense attorney Judy Clarke in her closing statements. “There is no excuse. No one’s trying to make one.”
Clarke’s final words to the jury said Dzhokhar was not self-radicalized, but influenced instead by Tamerlan to carry out the attacks.
Citing a document that showed the progression of the transfer of files containing Inspire magazine articles from Tamerlan’s Samsung computer to Dzhokhar’s Sony, Clarke said Tamerlan radicalized Dzhokhar.
Clarke said records from Dzhokhar’s phone clearly place him at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth at the time the BB’s were purchased at two New Hampshire stores, and that a note recovered from Tamerlan’s wallet had the stores’ phone numbers and addresses written down.
Clarke also presented to the jury surveillance footage showing Tamerlan leaving the Watertown Target with the backpacks used in the bombings, the receipt for which was also recovered in Tamerlan’s wallet.
Clarke circled back to testimony by Elena Graff, an FBI finger print analyst who said Dzhokhar’s prints were not found on the tool kit, pliers, gun cleaning kit, wiring book or pressure cooker lid, items that Clarke said “were seized because someone thought they were relevant to bomb making.”
The defense said it was Tamerlan who fatally shot Collier with the Ruger 9mm pistol, which Dzhokhar obtained from a friend and witness for the prosecution, Stephen Silva.
The defense’s closing argument continued to situate Tamerlan as the leader of the Marathon bombings, without whom Dzhokhar could and would not have carried out the attacks.
“We don’t deny that Dzhokhar fully participated in the events, but if not for Tamerlan, it would not have happened,” Clarke said. “We’re not asking you to excuse the conduct, but let’s look at the varying roles.”
Clarke said the government “cherry picked” the tweets they showed the jury, and if the court were to read the entirety of Dzhokhar’s Twitter account, they would understand Dzhokhar as a regular teenager and not a radicalized terrorist.
Regarding the message Dzhokhar wrote on the side of the Watertown boat three days after the bombings, Clarke said the defendant’s writings weren’t what the jury should expect from a violent jihadi, and were rather demonstrative of the “twisted belief” that his actions would have a constructive impact.
“It wasn’t a message to the world. It was this 19-year-old’s attempt to tell the world why they did what they did,” Clarke said.
The government’s rebuttal dismissed the defense strategy that Tamerlan radicalized his younger brother, with lead prosecutor William Weinreb calling it “an attempt to sidestep responsibility, not to take responsibility.”
“His own actions make him guilty,” Weinreb said.
Weinreb said there is no evidence to prove, as the defense has suggested, that it was Tamerlan who killed Collier with the Ruger gun, an event he described as a “cold-blooded execution.”
“We don’t know who pulled the trigger,” he said. “But this is all an effort to dodge responsibility. He’s trying to avoid responsibility for what he did.”
Weinreb said Tamerlan and Dzhokhar were co-conspirators in the Marathon bombings and the events of the following few days, including the kidnapping and carjacking of Dun Meng.
Dzhokhar could have successfully fled the scene of the Watertown shootout behind the wheel of Meng’s Mercedes, Weinreb said, but instead chose to do a U turn, attempting to run over the three police officers who were surrounding Tamerlan.
“He was so committed, he was willing to run over his own brother to kill a few police officers before it was all over,” Weinreb said.
Contrary to what was said in the defense’s closing statement, Weinreb said Dzhokhar had enough foresight to destroy his phone before climbing into the Watertown boat, suggesting he was clear-headed and strong when he wrote the boat-side message that detailed his “deepest and truest beliefs.”
These beliefs were informed by jihadi propaganda, which Weinreb said Dzhokhar consumed and internalized, regardless of whether or not the files were initially provided by the defendant’s brother.
“Most people read the materials and reject them. Only a tiny, tiny fraction read them and believe them,” Weinreb said. “To shred the bodies with young women and children with a homemade bomb, you’ve got to be different than other people.”
As Monday’s closing statements mark the end of the first stage of the Marathon trial, 12 of the 18 members of the jury will begin deliberations tomorrow, with six jurors on retainer as alternates.
