Victims, others react to Boston Marathon bombing verdicts

Caitlin Dickson
·Reporter

Nearly two years after two explosions killed three people and injured more than 260 at the 2013 Boston Marathon, the surviving half of the pair of brothers behind the terror attack has been convicted.

On Wednesday, a Boston jury found Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty on all 30 criminal counts against him, which include the murders of the three who died in the bombing — one of them an 8-year-old boy — as well as the MIT officer who was shot afterward, though it was never determined whether Tsarnaev or his older brother, Tamerlan, fired upon him.

Boston Marathon bombing survivor Karen Brassard, left, speaks alongside Laurie Scher, middle, and Mike Ward, Wednesday, April 8, 2015, outside federal court in Boston. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted on all charges Wednesday in the Boston Marathon bombing by a jury that will now decide whether the 21-year-old should be executed or shown mercy for what his lawyer says was a crime masterminded by his big brother. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

Survivors and family members of the bombing victims were at the courthouse for the reading of the verdicts, as they had been throughout the trial. Several of them testified against the now-21-year-old Tsarnaev, and a few, including Karen Brassard, took questions from the press following the jury’s announcement.

Brassard, her husband Ron, their daughter Krystara, and friend Victoria McGrath were all injured in the blasts that went off 10 feet from where they were watching a friend complete the Boston Marathon. Outside the courthouse, she told reporters she was “grateful to have [Tsarnaev] off the street” but wasn’t sure the verdict or anything could really offer closure to her or the other victims.

“I don’t know what justice is,” Brassard said. “We’ll all get back to our lives, get back to some sense of normalcy … [but] it’s not something you’ll ever be over. You’ll feel it forever. There’ll always be something that brings it back to the forefront.”

Brassard said that she felt it was important for her to be at the trial “for my healing to be complete” and that while she considers herself a pretty “passive person,” she was surprised by how angry it made her to see Tsarnaev in court.

“I don’t want to feel the anger that I think drives people to do hateful things, so I want to put that behind me,” she said.

The family of Sean Collier, the MIT police officer who was killed in the aftermath of the bombing, issued a statement saying, “While today’s verdict can never bring Sean back, we are thankful that Dzhokar [sic] Tsarnaev will be held accountable for the evil that he brought to so many families.”


Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker also praised the verdict, as did Boston Police Commissioner William Evans.

And Boston.com illustrated just how guilty the jury found Tsarnaev.


Of course, as the worst domestic terror attack since 9/11, the Boston Marathon bombing shook Americans far beyond Beantown, and Wednesday’s guilty verdicts prompted celebratory reactions from around the country.

Some took the opportunity to kick the already-down Rolling Stone magazine with a reminder of a different controversial cover story: the July 2013 profile of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev accompanied by a cover photo of the terrorism suspect looking like a brooding rock star.


Others took it upon themselves to offer their own — somewhat graphic — suggestions for how Tsarnaev should be penalized, since the jury has yet to determine his punishment.

 


But mostly people wanted to rally around the victims, survivors, and their families.

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