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03/28/2024 02:31:43 pm

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Boston Marathon Bomber’s Startling Apology to Victims for the First Time

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

(Photo : Photo provided by FBI via Getty Images) Convicted Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev gestured toward a surveillance camera in his holding cell in this 2013 surveillance image.

On Wednesday, Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev startled victims and survivors of the tragic Boston Marathon bombing as he broke his silence for the first time and apologized for the tragic incident.

The apology came as a judge formally executed the death on Tsarnaev. Tsarnaev's apology was the first he made in public after the Boston marathon bombing. Tsarnaev's statement followed the testimonies of the victims and relatives of the deceased from the Boston Marathon bombing, according to The Los Angeles Times.

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"If there is any lingering doubt, let there be no more. I did it, along with my brother," said Tsarnaev. "I ask Allah to have mercy on me, my brother and my family."

Tsarnaev was seen clasping his hands as he stood at the defense table. While he was said to have expressed remorse for the Boston marathon bombing, he reportedly never faced the victims and survivors of the incident.

"Now, I am sorry for the lives that I've taken, for the suffering that I've caused you, for the damage that I've done. Irreparable damage," Tsarnaev said. "Allah said in the Quran that no soul is burdened with more than it can bear, and you told us just how unbearable it was, how horrendous it was, this thing I put you through," he added. "I also wish that far more people had a chance to get up there (and speak), but I took them from you."

Addressing the survivors, Tsarnaev said that he prays for Allah "to bestow his mercy upon the deceased, those affected in the bombing and their families."

After Tsarnaev's piece, U.S. district judge George O'Toole Jr. formally imposed the death penalty on the 21-year-old, but not before quoting Shakespeare and Verdi, according to The Jakarta Post. The decision has already been made by a federal jury before the judge finalized it.

"The evil that men do lives after them. The good is often interred with their bones," said O'Toole, quoting Shakespeare.

Moreover, recalling Verdi's opera "Otello," O'Toole added, "Surely someone who believes that God smiles on and rewards the deliberate killing and maiming of innocents believes in a cruel God." He even continued further, saying, "That is not, it cannot be, the God of Islam. Anyone who has been led to believe otherwise has been maliciously and willfully deceived."

Since the September 11 attacks, Tsarnaev is the first person to have been handed the death penalty.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and his older brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev were found setting off two bombs at the finish line of the 2013 Boston marathon. Tamerlan died while fleeing police, according to CNN.

Two women and an eight-year-old boy died on that fateful day in April. More than 260 were injured, and 17 people were left amputees. An MIT police officer also died while hunting for the siblings.

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