Boston Marathon bomber’s lawyers want death sentence tossed
December 27, 2018
"BOSTON (AP) — Boston Marathon Bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s convictions or death sentence should be tossed because it was impossible for him to get a fair trial in the same city where the shrapnel-packed, pressure cooker bombs exploded, his lawyers told a federal appeals court on Thursday.
In a 500-page brief filed in the 1st U.S. District Court of Appeals, Tsarnaev’s legal team outlined a host of other problems with his 2015 trial, during which the defense admitted from the outset that he and his older brother carried out the attack. His appellate lawyers are also pointing to issues with jurors, certain testimony from surviving victims and the defense’s inability to tell jurors about links between Tsarnaev’s brother and an unsolved triple killing in 2011.
His lawyers argue the trial court judge’s “first fundamental error” was denying the defense’s repeated requests to move the case out of a city that was “traumatized by the bombings, ordered to shelter in place during the manhunt, saturated by prejudicial publicity and united in the Boston Strong movement.”
“This case should not have been tried in Boston,” the attorneys wrote...."
Boston Marathon bomber's lawyers want death sentence tossed
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Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev should not have been tried in Boston, appellate lawyers say
"...“When police arrested 19-year-old Jahar Tsarnaev, crowds flooded the streets in relief and jubilation. The community’s trauma and catharsis birthed Boston Strong, a movement that at once proclaimed defiance, resilience, and solidarity,” lawyers wrote. “The bombings united a region broken but brave. And as Tsarnaev’s trial began, ‘Boston ha[d] not yet fully recovered, and . . . every resident—whether or not they were at the [M]arathon that day, knew a victim, or were subject to the shelter-in-place order—was deeply and personally affected by the tragedy.'"
The court "deprived Tsarnaev of an impartial jury and a reliable verdict, in violation of the Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments,” lawyers wrote.
Juror 286 had tweeted two dozen times about the bombings, calling Tsarnaev a “piece of garbage” and describing being locked down with her family. She swore in her jury selection that she had not commented on the attack or been forced into a “shelter in place.”
Another person on the jury - Juror 138 - participated in a Facebook conversation about the case “where one of his friends urged him to ‘play the part,’ ‘get on the jury,’ and ‘send’ Tsarnaev ‘to jail where he will be taken care of,’” according to lawyers. This was a violation of the court’s order, and stood in contrast to his sworn testimony that none of his Facebook friends had been commenting on the trial, lawyers argued...."
Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev should not have been tried in Boston, appellate lawyers say
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