Posted on 05/13/2015 11:00:20 AM PDT by Citizen Zed
BOSTON — The government pushed strongly for the death penalty in their closing argument in the trial of the Boston Marathon bomber on Wednesday calling it the just punishment for the crime.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Steve Mellin painted a vivid picture of a reckless and remorseless young man driven by radical Islam, bent on destroying as many lives as possible during the week of April 15, 2013.
"He struck at what citizens hold dear. He went after the core values of society: children, family, neighborhoods, public safety. After all of the carnage and fear and terror that he has created the right decision is clear. It is your job to determine a just sentence: the only sentence that will do justice in this case will be a sentence of death," said Mellin.
Mellin said that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's actions, particularly the killing and maiming of the Richard family, were more than enough justification for the imposition of the death penalty as a sentence. Mellin honed in on how the Richard's youngest son, Martin, was the most vulnerable victim in the attacks and that Tsarnaev purposefully targeted him.
"Martin will never get to play high school sports or attend college or form life long friendships. Life for the Richard parents and their children will never be the same. Every race is an awful reminder that Martin is not running and that Martin is not there. The defendant took all of that away from four lovely, caring, positive people.
The defendant blinded the mother, maimed the six year old daughter by ripping off her leg and blew apart eight year-old Martin right in front of their son and father. There is no just punishment just for that other than death," said Mellin.
Tsarnaev's upbringing and his brother's influence is not important or relevant to whether or not he should receive a death sentence, he argued, though he noted frequently that his brother was a part of all their actions. He even dismissed the mitigating factors presented by his defense as "weightless" in the face of his heinous actions.
"Tamerlan Tsarnaev was not the defendant's master, they were partners in crime and brothers in arms. Each had a role to play and each played. Each came to believe in the teachings of Anwar al-Awlaki," said Mellin, referencing the radical Islamist the brothers followed.
He strongly emphasized that Tsarnaev saw his actions as part of a jihad against the United States and completely justified. The note he wrote while dying in the Watertown boat, Mellin said, made it clear that Tsarnaev had no regrets about his actions and took full responsibility for them all the while remaining defiant.
Mellin told jurors that life in prison is a lighter sentence than death by arguing that life in ADX Florence is not as bad as it seems. "His life will not be worse than death. He won’t be put in a dudgeon, he won’t be in a black hole: He’ll have his own cell with a window," said Mellin.
For those thinking that Tsarnaev would receive some kind of prison justice from an inmate with Boston ties, forget it, said Mellin, because he will protected by prison officials at all times.
"This defendant does not want to die, you know that, because he had many opportunities to die on the streets of Boston and Watertown," said Mellin.
With bacon in both hands...extra crispy.
This is one that I would definitely where I would like to see a firing squad on National TV around the world.
I’d have to agree with the prosecutor.
[’The only sentence that will do justice is death’]
Agreed - the more they wring their hands over islamic terrorists, the more they will attack the rest of us.
Send this clown to his 72 virgins pronto.
Public hanging on Boston Common with his worthless body fed to pigs
Death is too good for him, but it will keep him from giving interviews, getting love letters from teenyboppers, and getting his picture on the cover of magazines.
Give him a sex change operation, leave him in the men’s prison (general population) for 20 years or so then fry him.
If he gets death, I wonder if this MUDSLIME TERROIST will be executed as quickly as Timothy McVeigh was?
ANYONE wanna bet that he is still alive(or not executed) in 15 years?
Executing him will only raise his martyr status. Be lenient with him. Put him in general population and look the other way.
Actually, since he murdered a child, he won’t list very long in the general population. If he is condemned to death, he will be held out of the general population and his obituary will be written long after it would be if he was held with the general population. Either sentence is really the death penalty.
That’s the idea.
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