The jury selection for Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is in process, and while he faces 30 federal counts, including using a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death, he probably won’t face the death penalty.
Dr. Carole Lieberman, a bestselling author who wrote “Coping With Terrorism: Dreams Interrupted,” told Epoch Times that “it is unlikely” Tsarnaev will be sentenced to death because his lawyers could “successfully portray him as basically a good guy who was simply under the influence of a domineering brother.”
264 Injured
Tsarnaev, 21, could face the death penalty for detonating bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013. The bombing killed three people and injured scores more. Many lost limbs. One of the dead was an 8-year-old boy, Martin William Richard. According to public health officials, 264 victims sought treatment at area hospitals.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and his older brother, Tamerlan, who died after the bombing, also allegedly shot and killed Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier before trying to flee the Boston area.
“If they can persuasively demonstrate how the bombing was only his brother’s plan, and why Dzhokhar couldn’t free himself from being under his brother’s control, then the jury will come to blame the brother and feel sorry for Dzhokhar,” Lieberman said.
Tsarnaev is being defended by several high-profile lawyers, including Judy Clarke, who worked to defend “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski, mass killer Jared Lee Loughner, abortion clinic bomber Eric Rudolph, and others. David Bruck, Miriam Conrad, Timothy Watkins, and William Fick will also defend him.