News Explosion reported near Boston Marathon finish line

[jtbell]

I don't know how many of you all were actually watching the end unfold on TV, but it came across as the "ultimate reality show."

My wife and I tuned into the local 6pm news, only to have it interrupted after a few minutes by a press conference at which officials reported that they hadn't been able to find the suspect after a whole day of searching Watertown, and were therefore lifting the stay-at-home order and letting public transit resume service.

After a brief weather report (all there was time for in what was left of that half hour), the NBC 6:30 news came on with a wrapup of the day's events, including comments from reporters in Watertown about how people were coming back out onto the streets. Near the end of that half hour, one of those reporters cut in, saying that they had just heard a burst of gunfire, and a flood of law-enforcement vehicles was streaming by. It turned out that he was maybe a couple of blocks from where the suspect had hidden in a boat in a backyard.

For the next couple of hours we got a lot of chatter and speculation about the details of what was actually going on, just out of sight of the cameras. For variety, we switched to ABC, which carried several phone calls from residents holed up in nearby houses, telling us what they could see by peeking out their windows. Finally we got the word that the suspect was alive (barely), in custody, and had been whisked off to a hospital.

 

[edward]

WOW were they ever wrong.

The FBI admitted Friday they interviewed the now-deceased Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev two years ago and failed to find any incriminating information about him.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57580534/fbi-interviewed-dead-boston-bombing-suspect-years-ago/

 

[Vanadium 50]

WOW were they ever wrong.

I don't think even the FBI has interview techniques good enough to find evidence of crimes two years in the future.

 

[WannabeNewton]

Kudos to the cops. I watched it on the live coverage and they did a hell of a job. At least in bad times like these, people become unified and put on their best colors. Watching the locals cheer and congratulate the cops was very heart warming.

 

[Monique]

With their pictures all over the internet, why would they rob a 7-11? Obviously, they did, but that's just begging to be caught.

I understood from the news that they didn't rob the convenience store, that was labeled as misinformation. They were present in the store when the robbery took place. However, time will tell what the exact sequence of events was.

*edit* here a source: http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/312193/250/Boston-bombing-suspects-did-not-rob-7-11

The suspects were at the 7-Eleven around the time of the robbery but they did not rob the store said, State Police Superintendent Timothy Alban at an evening press conference on Friday.

At an earlier press conference morning, when Alben described the manhunt and standoff that resulted in the death of an MIT police officer, he also said that the two brothers robbed a 7-Eleven.

Chabris says the story of the robbed 7-Eleven was online immediately and spread quickly. She has been calling journalists all day to ask them to make a correction.

 

[MarneMath]

I actually have lived overseas for some time so I get it. I came to understand just why is it the non-Western world is so different, which I discussed at length in this post. But I also saw how third world economies tended to operate and I saw that contrary to what the narrative tends to be, the US is still very much the land of opportunity. Given the state of the Caususes and central Asia, can you honestly say he would have had more opportunities there than here?

And even if what you said is true, it still doesn't take into account the fact that if he was really so interested in Chechen independence why attack a bunch of Americans? Why not go after the Russians some how? I think you're underestimating the corrupting influence Islamism really has. It is a hostile ideology that can and will poison people's minds. Most Islamic terrorists come from well educated middle class backgrounds. The elder brother would certainly seem to be the exception in that regard.

I don't think this thread is really appropriate place for us to go at length on this topic, so I'll make two quick points. Even if country A has less opportunity than country B, doesn't mean person x would prefer country A over country B. There's a thousand and one reasons why someone would prefer or feel nostalgic for home that has nothing to do with economic advancement.

I never stated anything about Chechen independence. When I was in Iraq, we constantly found Chechen fighters. I simply stated the aspect of jihad that some Chechen extreme Muslim have done. As for how corrupting Islam is, I won't comment on that either. I would just hope people on this forum would have the ability to not judge an entire religion based on the very few people who decide to use violence to advance a political goal not entirely consistent with their beliefs.

 

[aquitaine]

I never stated anything about Chechen independence. When I was in Iraq, we constantly found Chechen fighters. I simply stated the aspect of jihad that some Chechen extreme Muslim have done. As for how corrupting Islam is, I won't comment on that either. I would just hope people on this forum would have the ability to not judge an entire religion based on the very few people who decide to use violence to advance a political goal not entirely consistent with their beliefs.

Hitchens said it best, judge it by its texts and statements by its authorities, just like any other religion.

I understood from the news that they didn't rob the convenience store, that was labeled as misinformation. They were present in the store when the robbery took place. However, time will tell what the exact sequence of events was.

I think this whole exercise demonstrates how confusing a fluid situation can be. Still, I don't think I've ever seen anything like this, even the hunt for the Unabomber wasn't this intense.

 

[Evo]

I understood from the news that they didn't rob the convenience store, that was labeled as misinformation.

Yes, I know, my comment was from yesterday when it was still being said they were involved in the robbery.

 

[jim hardy]

Yes, I know, my comment was from yesterday when it was still being said they were involved in the robbery.

It's hard to not get swept up.

It will be interesting to watch how the journalism community reflects on its frenzy.
The next hurricane season after Hurricane Andrew the Miami TV stations acted very calm.
The year after that it was back to their old behavior - scream shout and rush about.

I suppose it's natural to want to be exciting on camera. Being a joe-sixpack plodder type myself I try to consciously filter that out of the news because I am susceptible to frenzy.
I prefer listening reporters who are calm and deliberate.
The drumbeating soundtrack in most newscast introductions I find a turnoff, pure self aggrandizement .

 

[OmCheeto]

It's hard to not get swept up.

It will be interesting to watch how the journalism community reflects on its frenzy.
The next hurricane season after Hurricane Andrew the Miami TV stations acted very calm.
The year after that it was back to their old behavior - scream shout and rush about.

I suppose it's natural to want to be exciting on camera. Being a joe-sixpack plodder type myself I try to consciously filter that out of the news because I am susceptible to frenzy.
I prefer listening reporters who are calm and deliberate.
The drumbeating soundtrack in most newscast introductions I find a turnoff, pure self aggrandizement .

I get 99% of my news from PF.

God help me if you kids are watching Fox...

 

[humanino]

The drumbeating soundtrack in most newscast introductions I find a turnoff, pure self aggrandizement .

I believe it is much, much worse. It is in fact partly responsible for the next tragedy.

 

[OmCheeto]

...
Hitchens said it best, judge it by its texts and statements by its authorities, just like any other religion.
...

What if,

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/558057_10152753776220527_234125752_n.jpg​

what if...

--------------------------
ok by me if you lock this thread. It's gone religiosity, as expected...

 

[OmCheeto]

I believe it is much, much worse. It is in fact partly responsible for the next tragedy.

BAM!

er...

I mean, bingo.

thanks humanio. Good share.

 

[turbo]

I'm having some trouble with the way that "suspect #2" is being treated. There are some in our government that want to deprive him of any legal representation, starting with no Miranda rights.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/201...-marathon-bombing-suspect-is-un-american?lite

There are some in our government that want him imprisoned as an "enemy combatant" (Gitmo, anyone?).
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/political-insider/2013/apr/20/saxby-chambliss-treat-boston-suspect-enemy-combata/

And yet others who would like to see him tortured.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/20/greg-ball-torture_n_3122524.html

The bomber came to the US as a child and has been here over a decade. He is a naturalized US citizen. Can any US citizen be deprived of basic legal rights? If so, where does it stop?. The crimes that he and his older brother are accused of are horrific. Still, is the US legal system unable to process him even in the face of accusations of such terrible offenses?

IMO, I would be a breath of fresh air if politicians would stop trying to subvert our judicial system to make points at home.

 

[Evo]

I'm having some trouble with the way that "suspect #2" is being treated. There are some in our government that want to deprive him of any legal representation, starting with no Miranda rights.

They will be using the "public safety exception" which does not read him his miranda rights for 48 hours based on the act of terrorism. It's legal and I find this appropriate. It will probably do them no good anyway, unfortunately.

 

[leroyjenkens]

They will be using the "public safety exception" which does not read him his miranda rights for 48 hours based on the act of terrorism. It's legal and I find this appropriate. It will probably do them no good anyway, unfortunately.

I tried reading up a little on this and the verbiage is a little too technical for me. I have a couple of questions, if anyone knows.
What's the big deal with reading the Miranda rights in the first place? Doesn't a person have rights regardless if they've been read to them or not? And what does delaying him the reading of his rights have to do with public safety?

 

[jim hardy]

What's the big deal with reading the Miranda rights in the first place?

There exist lawyers who'd consider it a feather in their cap to get him off on a technicality.

Part of me does pity the kid for the mistake he's made - but not enough to let bygones be bygones.

I saw the original 'Dirty Harry" movie just the other day. It seems more relevant today than it did in 1975.

 

[aquitaine]

What if,

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/558057_10152753776220527_234125752_n.jpg​

what if...

--------------------------
ok by me if you lock this thread. It's gone religiosity, as expected...

I'm not Christian, and I do view the Westboro Church as being representative of the real Christian faith. You will find no double standards with me.

 

[cristo]

What's the big deal with reading the Miranda rights in the first place? Doesn't a person have rights regardless if they've been read to them or not? And what does delaying him the reading of his rights have to do with public safety?

Isn't it so that a suspect isn't coerced into saying something that will incriminate him under a high-pressure interrogation environment, and so it is clear that he knows he has the right to remain silent, and to consult a lawyer. This suspect will still have the rights, he just doesn't have to be reminded of them. So if the first thing he says is that he wants a lawyer, and will invoke his right to remain silent, then there will be no difference to any other arrest. And, since this suspect is probably smart, I can't see him talking without a lawyer! (I guess this is what Evo was thinking, when she said it will probably do them no good).

 

[aquitaine]

Isn't it so that a suspect isn't coerced into saying something that will incriminate him under a high-pressure interrogation environment, and so it is clear that he knows he has the right to remain silent, and to consult a lawyer. This suspect will still have the rights, he just doesn't have to be reminded of them. So if the first thing he says is that he wants a lawyer, and will invoke his right to remain silent, then there will be no difference to any other arrest. And, since this suspect is probably smart, I can't see him talking without a lawyer! (I guess this is what Evo was thinking, when she said it will probably do them no good).

Wasn't he also bleeding heavily and taken away in an ambulance? Even if he was Mirandized I doubt he was in a good enough mental condition to effectively process it anyway.

 

[OmCheeto]

I'm having some trouble with the way that "suspect #2" is being treated. ...

Not me. I'd have shot him in the nuts if I'd found him bleeding in my boat. As my interaction on FB with someone I'll call "Sybil" points out:

Welcome to the police state of America...
Where your rights mean nothing because a criminal is on the loose...

Some drunk person chimes in, and Sybil responded:

[Drunk person], I promise you, if us Irish in the city would have seen this guy, he wouldn't have made it out alive...Hes lucky the cops found him before we did...

at which point, I went into full troll attack mode...

Things that make you go; "hmmm..." So [Sybil], you seem to imply that it's ok for you and your Irish friends to become vigilantes, and murder someone, but it's not ok for the police to search houses. Personally, if I had a terrorist holding me hostage in my own home, I'd really like to have the police knock on my door. Godspeed to the police, peace be unto all Bostonians, and may god have mercy on that kid's soul. ps. I'd have shot him in the nuts if I'd found him in my boat. That's how much I dislike terrorists.

Sybil did not respond to my post, but did keep going on and on, and, um. I think Sybil might be one of those people who people have been claiming, needs mental help.

 

[cristo]

Wasn't he also bleeding heavily and taken away in an ambulance? Even if he was Mirandized I doubt he was in a good enough mental condition to effectively process it anyway.

In order to legally waive your rights (i.e. for anything you say without a lawyer present after being read the rights) you need to agree. If not or barely conscious, then you cannot knowingly agree.

 

[BobG]

I'm having some trouble with the way that "suspect #2" is being treated. There are some in our government that want to deprive him of any legal representation, starting with no Miranda rights.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/201...-marathon-bombing-suspect-is-un-american?lite

There are some in our government that want him imprisoned as an "enemy combatant" (Gitmo, anyone?).
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/political-insider/2013/apr/20/saxby-chambliss-treat-boston-suspect-enemy-combata/

And yet others who would like to see him tortured.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/20/greg-ball-torture_n_3122524.html

The bomber came to the US as a child and has been here over a decade. He is a naturalized US citizen. Can any US citizen be deprived of basic legal rights? If so, where does it stop?. The crimes that he and his older brother are accused of are horrific. Still, is the US legal system unable to process him even in the face of accusations of such terrible offenses?

IMO, I would be a breath of fresh air if politicians would stop trying to subvert our judicial system to make points at home.

The reading him his rights is almost meaningless. It's just to make sure even the uneducated (i.e. - those that don't watch police shows on TV) know their rights.

I think what they really mean is that they won't technically arrest him for 48 hours (or however long they question him). That way they can question him as a witness without a lawyer to gain intel on anyone else associated with the bombing. That doesn't mean any info that they get from him that incriminates him would be guaranteed of being admitted in court.

In this case, I don't think authorities would have to depend on his answers to their interrogation to convict him and whether or not any answers he gives can be used in his own court case is the least of the authorities' concern. On the other hand, I don't think he's likely to give information that would incriminate anyone else (but you never know). I do think they could get a more clear picture of just what motivated them, where they got the information needed to construct the bombs, etc. In that sense, this would be a good case for denying him his right to representation for at least some initial questioning.

The benefits gained are that he won't have a lawyer that will help him use the information he has that the authorities want to plea bargain a more lenient sentence (but it doesn't necessarily mean that he couldn't try to negotiate a better deal on his own or decide he's not going to give any info until he has someone to help him negotiate a better deal.)

I think classifying him as an enemy combatant has some problems. In fact, I think they really mean an unlawful combatant. If he's an enemy combatant, we're acknowledging his actions as a legitimate act of war and he should be held as a POW until the war ends (in fact, most of the Gitmo residents would have been released already if we had some country besides the US where we could release them).

Except in this case, the opposing force was an "army" of two, they've been defeated, and now we release all the POWs - in this case, the surviving suspect. I don't think we really want to do that. But if we did, then we could turn around and prosecute him for war crimes, since there was obviously no military value in the target they chose. I still think that's a really stupid idea.

Even if they mean an unlawful combatant, I think there's some problems. Do some people really want to reraise the issue that the Geneva Convention doesn't apply to unlawful combatants (including mercenaries) and so we're justified in torturing them? It's true that the Geneva Convention can't be used to protect unlawful combatants, but that doesn't mean they have no human rights (after all, it's not the government that gives us those rights and it's not the government that can take those rights away).

Plus, this would be a bad case to use to reraise the issue. It's very doubtful Tsarnaev has any information useful enough to justify torture. In this case, I'd feel like we torturing him just to show we can and I think that would definitely be a war crime in itself.

Maybe there's some other benefit to classifying him as an "unlawful" enemy combatant, but I don't really see what that is, based on the appearance that these two seem to have acted entirely on their own (at least based on the info available to the public right now).

 

[nsaspook]

Miranda in this case is IMO a unimportant formality (that should be done) for him or the government.

The only thing he can tell them that's important is information about a possible cell or supporters. He's fried 100x times from thousands of frames of videos, digital images , police shootouts and eye witnesses that saw him drop the bomb. The guy is smart and surely knows about his rights without being Mirandized. He has two options, talk and possibility avoid the death penalty if he has valuable information or fry.

Calling him a "combatant" of any kind would give him an honor that's not warranted for a murdering bastard.

 

[turbo]

He can't "fry". He will get multiple life terms, but Mass doesn't execute people.

 

[nsaspook]

He can't "fry". He will get multiple life terms, but Mass doesn't execute people.

Terrorist is a federal crime. He will be tried in federal court.

 

[Evo]

If he survives to be jailed, they will have to keep him in solitary confinement, and with guards, he won't last a day if he's placed with other prisoners, IMO.

 

[Evo]

More info.

Horrific New Info on How Boston Suspect Drove Over Older Brother in Midnight Escape

He relayed the horrific scene where Dzhokhar allegedly drove over his older brother:
"[Tamerlan] all of a sudden comes out from under cover and just starts walking down the street, shooting at our police officers, trying to get closer," Deveau said. "Now, my closest officer is five to 10 feet away, and they're exchanging gunfire between them. And he runs out of ammunition -- the bad guy -- and so one of my police officers comes off the side and tackles him in the street.
"We're trying to get him handcuffed. There's two or three police officers handcuffing him in the street -- the older brother. At the same time, at the last minute -- they obviously have tunnel vision, it's a very, very stressful situation -- one of them yells out, 'Look out!' and here comes the black SUV, the carjacked car, directly at them. They dive out of the way, and he (the younger brother) drives over his brother and drags him a short distance down the street."

http://news.yahoo.com/horrific-boston-suspect-drove-over-older-brother-midnight-235428993.html?_sr=1

An eyewitness on tv said the dead suspect was dragged ~20 feet by his brother.

 

[cristo]

More info.



http://news.yahoo.com/horrific-boston-suspect-drove-over-older-brother-midnight-235428993.html?_sr=1

An eyewitness on tv said the dead suspect was dragged ~20 feet by his brother.

There are conflicting reports (and eyewitnesses are not always to be believed!). The doctor who tried to save him saw no evidence of this on the body:

http://bostonherald.com/news_opinio...04/er_doctor_bombing_suspect_died_at_hospital

When asked about reports that Tsarnaev was run over by his fleeing brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Wolfe said he did not see any obvious injuries that would back up that theory.

“I certainly did not see any tire marks or the usual things we see with someone run over by a car,” he said.

 

[ImaLooser]

I tried reading up a little on this and the verbiage is a little too technical for me. I have a couple of questions, if anyone knows.
What's the big deal with reading the Miranda rights in the first place? Doesn't a person have rights regardless if they've been read to them or not? And what does delaying him the reading of his rights have to do with public safety?

It is a rather strange game. Consult a lawyer for an opinion.