Court Considers Reinstating Death Sentence for Boston Marathon Bomber

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted of 30 charges against him for setting off bombs back in 2013.
• This year, the United States Supreme Court may reinstate the Boston Marathon bomber’s death sentence.
• Tsarnaev’s case will not be heard until the end of the year.

On Monday, the Supreme Court said it is considering reimposing the death sentence for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bomber. This is in opposition to President Joe Biden’s stance against capital punishment.

In its last six months in office, the Trump administration filed an appeal that would implement the executions of 13 federal inmates, which the justices granted to hear. These included three inmates in the final week of the former president’s term.

Tsarnaev’s case will not be heard until around the fourth quarter of the year. It is also vague how President Biden will go about the bomber’s case; though initially, the Obama administration, where Biden served as Vice President, made the prosecution and decision to explore a death penalty.

In more than his two months in office, President Biden’s administration has already upended Trump’s position in many high court cases. He also committed to ending the federal death penalty but gave no plans yet as of this writing.

There seems to have no changes in the Justice Department’s position with regards to the case of Tsarnaev.

The federal appeals court in Boston trashed Tsarnaev’s sentence since, according to them, the judge assigned to his case was not able to ensure that the jury is not biased against the bomber. The Justice Department then granted the appeal, where he asked the justices to hear the trial and make decisions already by the end of the court’s current term.

Although the lawyers of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev admitted to the crimes he and his brother made, they claimed that Tsarnaev should have a lesser sentence since his brother was the mastermind.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was eventually convicted of all three charges against him for setting off two bombs at the finish line of the marathon on April 15, 2013. The charges include the use of weapons of mass destruction, conspiracy, and killing of a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer during the brothers’ attempt to getaway.

Source: AOL