Grand jury indicts Tsarnaev
June 27, 2013
A United States grand jury indicted Tsarnaev on 30 counts, according to federal prosecutors in Boston on Thursday. The charges included using a weapon of mass destruction and killing four people.
The accused could face life imprisonment or the death penalty on 17 of the counts.
No comments were immediately available.
Dzohkhar Tsarnaev, 19, and his older brother, Tamerlan, 26, now deceased, are believed to have carried out the attack at the Boston Marathon in April 15.
Twin blasts from shrapnel-filled pressure cookers placed near the finish line killed three people and wounded more than 250.
The fourth victim, a police officer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was shot dead several days later as the brothers - ethnic Chechens whose family had emigrated from Dagestan - attempted to escape from authorities.
The older brother died in a shootout with police the same evening. Authorities found the younger Tsarnaev less than 24 hours in serious condition from wounds sustained in the gunfight.
Tsarnaev, 19, has remained in a police hospital since his capture on April 19.
Neither of the Tsarnaevs were on federal watch lists, but the FBI did interview Tamerlan in 2011 after Russia told US officials that he was a follower of radical Islam.
kms/dr (AP, AFP, Reuters)