Monday, April 27, 2015
Associated Press
BOSTON
Lawyers for Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will begin presenting witnesses this week in the penalty phase of his trial as they try to make their case that he should be sentenced to life in prison — not death — for his role in the deadly 2013 attack.
Tsarnaev was convicted of 30 federal charges in the twin bombings that killed three people and injured more than 260 on April 15, 2013. Seventeen of the charges carry the possibility of the death penalty.
Prosecutors called 17 witnesses over three days, mainly victims who lost loved ones or limbs in the explosions. The defense case begins today in federal court.
Here are some things to expect:
Legal analysts say the defense strategy — first and foremost — will be to humanize Tsarnaev. Prosecutors have depicted Tsarnaev as a callous and heartless terrorist who placed a bomb just feet from a group of children and targeted the marathon for maximum bloodshed.
The witness list has not been made public, but legal experts expect the defense to call family members and friends who will describe Tsarnaev as a well-behaved child who appeared to adjust well to his life in the U.S. after moving here with his parents and siblings from Russia about a decade before the bombings, when he was 8 or 9.
The defense also is expected to call experts who can testify about the political climate in Kyrgyzstan and the volatile region of Dagestan, Russia, an area bordering Chechnya where the Tsarnaev family lived before moving to the U.S.
Other witnesses may testify about problems in the Tsarnaev family.
Judge George O’Toole Jr. told the jury he expects the penalty phase to last about four weeks. Since the prosecution case took less than a week, that leaves two to three weeks for the defense to present its case.