The case against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will soon be officially underway, as jury selection begins Monday in Boston, Massachusetts. BuzzFeed News reporter Mike Hayes is reporting from the courthouse.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
AP Uncredited
BOSTON, Massachusetts — On Monday morning, 200 to 250 people will report to the jury assembly hall inside Moakley Courthouse in downtown Boston. Then more than 200 people will report to the courthouse in the afternoon. Then, another approximately 500 people will report on Tuesday — and then the same on Wednesday. Every person is a possible juror who will hear the case against 21-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the accused Boston Marathon bomber.
About 1,200 citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have been ordered to adjust their schedules to potentially sit for the trial. In total, over 3,000 people received summonses as the court attempts to seat a jury in the same city where the April 15, 2013 bombing that killed three and maimed more than 260 took place.
The official start of the trial marks an end to a long waiting period both for the nation and especially the family of the deceased and runners injured during the April 15, 2013 attack.
This is a death penalty case, even though Massachusetts abolished capital punishment three decades ago.
Tsarnaev's lawyers tried every maneuver the U.S. legal system afforded them to keep the trial from getting underway this week, including motions in the final days of 2014 to stay the jury selection, move the trial, and delay the start from January to September 2015. Ultimately the court of appeals and presiding Judge George O'Toole — who had already delayed the start of the trial from November 2014 to January 2015 and denied one motion by the defense to move the trial to Washington, D.C. — were not moved by the Tsarnaev team's arguments.
Jury selection is expected to take weeks, and the courthouse is under heavy security.
Prosecutors have accused Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, both ethnic Chechens, of the attack. Tamerlan died in a gunfight with police.
Tsarnaev's defense team, from left to right: David Bruck, July Clarke, and Miriam Conrad.
AP Uncredited
Here's the 30-count indictment:
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