Djokhar Tsarnaev, one of the two perpetrators of the Boston Marathon attacks was sentenced, Friday, May 15, to the death penalty. After 14 hours of deliberation, the twelve jurors of the Federal Court of Massachusetts, decided to follow the requisitions of the prosecutors. The 21-year-old, of Chechen origin, was convicted on April 8 of planting two bombs with his brother Tamerlan near the finish line of the race on April 15, 2013, killing three and causing 264 wounded.
For the death penalty to be passed, the jurors, seven women and five men, had to reach a unanimous decision. Of the 30 charges against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 17 were punishable by death. “After all the carnage and dread and terror it has caused, the right decision is clear, said prosecutor Steven Mellin at the conclusion of the trial. The only sentence that does justice in this case is death ”, he added. Upon reading the sentence, the condemned man remained, as throughout the trial, impassive.
The defense insisted on his brother’s hold
During the four months of the hearing, the defense strategy consisted in maintaining that Djokhar Tsarnaev had only acted under the influence of his brother. Described as a ” good boy “, a pupil respected by his teachers, pampered by his family, the accused would have fallen into horror only because of Tamerlan, who was killed during the manhunt that followed the attacks. “If Tamerlan hadn’t been there, it would never have happened”, said Judy Clarke, one of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s lawyers.
But this specialist in the death penalty, who avoided the death penalty in desperate cases like Theodore Kaczynski, better known under the name of “Unabomber”, the murderer of several people thanks to parcel bombs, Zacharias Moussaoui, the French involved in the attacks of September 11, 2001, or Eric Rudolph, the perpetrator of the Atlanta Olympic Games bombing in 1996, failed to humanize Tsarnaev sufficiently to save him death. His arguments broke against overwhelming facts, a succession of testimonies more poignant than the others and an obvious lack of repentance on the part of the accused.
“The callousness and indifference that allows you to destroy people’s lives, ignore their pain and grief is not going to go away just because you are going to be locked in a prison cell., had warned the prosecutor William Weinreb, it is what allows you to be a terrorist and it is what isolates you from any feeling of remorse ”. The only moment the young Chechen had shown emotion was when his aunt, called to the stand, collapsed in tears, preventing him from testifying. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev then took a tissue to wipe a tear from his face.
Families opposed the death penalty
The death penalty was the subject of debate throughout the trial. In the courthouse, but also outside. Some considered that sentencing Tsarnaev to death amounted to making him a martyr. The parents of Martin Richard, an 8-year-old boy killed in the attack, them, had signed on April 17 a column published in the Boston Globe to declare their opposition to capital punishment. “The accused murdered our 8 year old son, mutilated our 7 year old daughter, and stole part of our soul”, wrote Bill and Denise Richard. But at the same time they claimed that the application of the death penalty would give rise to several years of additional proceedings, of appealing the decision, risking making them “Relive the most painful day of our life”.
It is indeed very likely that the defense will now appeal. Of the 80 people sentenced to death by a federal court since 1988, only three have been executed. Some have died in prison, others have committed suicide, but most of the other cases are still not closed. The last execution in the state of Massachusetts dates back to 1947, while the state abolished the death penalty in 1984. But since Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was accused of an act of terrorism with the use of a weapon of mass destruction, his case falls under federal justice, which has the power to demand the death penalty. The choice of the jury in a state which has abolished the death penalty was particularly delicate because only jurors who were not hostile to it in principle had been selected.
“Adequate punishment for this heinous crime”
“We know all too well that no verdict will heal the souls of those who have lost loved ones, nor the bodies and spirits of those who have suffered lifelong injuries as a result of these cowardly acts. But the supreme punishment is an adequate punishment for this heinous crime ”, said Justice Minister Loretta Lynch. “We hope that the end of this trial will bring some form of appeasement to the victims and their families”, she added.
Among these, Sydney Corcoran, himself injured, while his mother, Celeste lost both legs in the attack, reacted on Twitter, a few minutes after the verdict. “My mother and I now think he [Djokhar Tsarnaev] will leave and we will be able to move on. Justice “, adding: “ An eye for an eye “. A statement that sounds like an echo of the message that Djokhar Tsarnaev wrote inside the boat in which the police had found him after three days of tracking: “The US government is killing our innocent civilians. […] We Muslims are one body, you hurt one of us, you hurt all of us. […] Stop killing our innocent people and we’ll stop. “
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