The Boston Marathon trial found Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty of 30 counts of murder following the bombing that occurred at the Boston Marathon in April 2013. This decision puts the country one step closer to finding peace after this act of terrorism, yet also hints at what is to come.
“All you heard were sirens, cries and screams,” witness Shane O’ Hara said in an interview with CNN. “The thing that haunts me is making decisions – who needed help first, who needed more, who was more injured than the other one. I felt it wasn’t my role to make those decisions, but you have to do that.”
Survivors of the bombing provided chilling details of the event.
“My bones were laying next to me on the sidewalk,” Rebekah Gregory, who lost her leg during the bombing, said at the trial. “That’s the day I thought I was going to die.”
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 21 year olds, was said to have planted the bombs with his brother, 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who was killed in a shootout with police following the bombing. Dzhokhar attended the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth and was seen on campus by security cameras hours after the bombing. His defense team claimed that his older brother had been the main culprit of the terrorist act, with Dzhokhar solely “aiding and abetting.”
It took the jury nearly 30 minutes to read all 30 guilty verdicts out loud. Images of the event, including graphic scenes of those who had been injured or killed, along with photos detailing Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s allegiance to militant Islamist groups and an article on his laptop entitled “How to Build A Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom” were shown. Although the jury found Tsarnaev guilty, the punishment still needs to be decided during the second part of the trial. Tsarnaev is slated to receive either the death penalty or life in prison.
“We are gratified by the jury’s verdict and thank everyone who played a role in the trial for their hard work,” Carmen Ortiz, the U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts, said.
Information from this article taken from cnn.com and abcnews.go.com.