Truth Seeker

Just a few pics from todays status conference in Boston.  See?  No Free Jahar shirts for those of you who addressed that issue in the past week. 

From what I’ve heard from a few people who were at court, there were a few other local residents who it turns out are supporters as well and think Jahar is getting railroaded…also another woman who was at the Marathon right by the Forum restaurant and thought it was suspicious how fast the original mail box was swapped out for a new one.  She’s given her statement and may or may not be called as a witness but now follows every aspect of the case because she saw things that didn’t sit right with her.

The whole conference was a little over 20 minutes and Jahars lawyers got in a few sarcastic comments at the ridiculousness of the timeline as well as the constant refusal for discovery from the prosecution. They also don’t believe, for the evidence that is being housed at a separate facility, that they should have to provide the prosecution with a list of any and all reports, transcripts, photos etc that they make copies of as it would give the prosecution an unfair advantage into the mindset and defense strategy that Jahar’s lawyers plan to use.  They argue that it would tip their hand if that had to list item by item specifically which interviews or reports they made copies of.  The protection order is already in place and any copies made can only be seen by the defense or their staff and must be returned or destroyed once the case is over so demanding to see what the defense is focusing on is unnecessary and again, gives the prosecution an idea of which way the defense is going to play this thing.

I announced on twitter that I had an idea for a great present/project that everyone can participate in for Jahar! Here it is:

I announced on twitter that I had an idea for a great present/project that everyone can participate in for Jahar! Here it is:

In this gut-wrenching talk, Sergeant Andrew Chambers shares the haunting story of his time in Iraq and the tough transition home that landed him in jail. It’s a powerful testimony to the struggle our soldiers face when they come home, and the tragic ways that they can be denied the help they need. 

For any veterans who need help, you can find a list of resources here. Among them, the Wounded Warrior Project does outstanding work with wounded vets. 

For anyone looking to support a veteran, we encourage you to heed Chambers’s advice: "Find a veteran and listen to his story. A lot of us just need somebody to talk to." 

"Holy Fking Sht. That’s Dzhokhar!"

Esquire, by Luke Dittrich

The main press scrum was a block away, at the corner of the cordoned-off street where the two Tsarnaev brothers had lived, but there was a little breakaway group of reporters much closer to me. They’d gathered around an older guy in a sweater and jeans who looked a little like Richard Dreyfuss. He was holding a book in one hand and talking into the cameras, and when I looked at him again I realized it was Larry Aaronson. I walked over and waited on the outskirts till there was an opening, then stepped in and clapped Larry on the shoulder. He blurted my name and smiled a weary smile.

We found a place to sit on a low wall outside of a bike shop. I saw that the book he was carrying was the 2011 yearbook for the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. That was the year the younger of the two brothers, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, graduated.

“I knew Dzhokhar,” Larry said, patting the book and shaking his head. “Can you believe it?”

Of course I could. I’d have been surprised if he hadn’t known Dzhokhar. Larry taught at Rindge for decades. American history. He taught my sisters, he taught me. We read Howard Zinn, we tore down Columbus. Larry would bring in the most amazing guests. We’d be studying the evolution of the American legal system one day, and the next day we’d show up for class and there was Alan Dershowitz, ready to answer questions. It wasn’t surprising that Larry knew Alan Dershowitz, either. Larry knew everybody. Whenever I’m not in Cambridge and I meet somebody from Cambridge and we’re searching for some sort of common ground, I toss Larry’s name out first, and it almost always hits. I was in India a few years back following Matt Damon around for a story and we spent a lot of time talking about Larry.

When the bombs exploded on Marathon Monday, Larry did what most people did. He wondered. He wondered whether it was some right-wing wingnut, he speculated about the significance of it happening on Patriot’s Day, on tax day, he considered it likely that it was some bedraggled lone wolf, an heir to Kaczynski.

But over the next few days the story became more personal, less abstract. It spiraled across the river.

“I found out that Brian Downes, who was a guidance counselor, and Debbie Downes, who was a special needs teacher—their son Patrick lost his leg. And their brand new daughter-in-law lost her leg. And then Matt Nelson—I don’t know if you remember Matt Nelson, he’s the administrative aide to [Cambridge mayor] Henrietta Davis—he was a Rindge graduate? His girlfriend, who was an eighth-grade teacher, she took shrapnel to the chest. And then, you remember the Valverdes? Sara Valverde and Mimi Valverde? Anyhow, she’s got some, Sara’s got some serious injuries. At first they didn’t know if she was going to recover or not. And so then I’m going, ‘this shit’s hitting home, this shit’s hitting home!’ You know this is no longer some sort of, ‘Okay, I’m going to analyze this, is this domestic or foreign, what does this mean, you know, what’s the take on this whole fucking thing, right?’”

Then, on Thursday night, the story spiraled even closer.

“I’m watching the Internet, and they start posting the pictures. And the pictures start getting more and more clear. And I go, holy fucking shit. That’s Dzhokhar!”

Except it wasn’t. Because it couldn’t have been. Because there’s just no fucking way. Because this was every good kid doing everything right. Because Dzhokhar was loveable and serious and reliable and competitive and athletic and just… no fucking way. Larry opened the yearbook and started thumbing through it, showing me the photos he’d shot of Dzhokhar. That sweet face, that Dylanesque hair. No fucking way. Besides, the kid lived three doors down on Larry’s street! Norfolk Street. The street that’s now cordoned off. The street where Larry last saw Dzhokhar, in January. And it wasn’t like there’d been some change of character, some change of appearance. Nothing.

The kid had called Larry out.

“Larry! How you doing?”

“Whoa! How you doing? I always forget you live right here!”

Dzhokhar told Larry he was going to UMass Dartmouth, studying engineering. Larry asked if he was still wrestling, and the kid said, no, he’d given that up, and Larry said, shit, that was a shame, because he was so good at it. He told him if he ever needed any help on papers, or with references, or whatever, to give him a buzz, and the kid said yeah, he would, and that was that. They walked away from each other. Afterwards, Larry had thought to himself that the kid was probably going to use that engineering degree of his to go back home and rebuild Chechnya, because that’s the sort of kid he was. Larry liked the thought of that: Dzhokhar comes to the States, comes to Cambridge, gets exposed to all the crazy crosscurrents of culture and thought that you have around here, and emerges as a force for fucking good in the world.

So yeah, those pictures on the Internet. They might have looked a little like Dzhokhar. But there was no fucking way.

Larry had gone to sleep at 4 a.m., and woke up at 6:30 to a flurry of texts and phone calls. Within a few minutes of putting his feet to the floor, Larry heard an orchestral swell, dozens of sirens, coming closer. He looked out the window. The spiral had tightened into a noose.

“Shit,” Larry thought to himself. “The war hasn’t come home. It’s at my front fucking door.”

The cops evacuated Larry and everyone else on the block, sent them down the street, where a media scrum was forming, where their memories and opinions were plundered. Larry had lost count of who he’d already talked to. CNN. Diane Sawyer. NPR. PBS. Who knows who else. Only organization he turned down was Fox, because c’mon, this was still Cambridge. He was tired and shaken and confused. He was trying to make it clear to me how unbelievable it was that Dzhokhar, who at that moment was bleeding in the belly of a backyard boat, could be involved in any of this. It wasn’t like every kid he’d gotten to know at Rindge was a saint. There were bad kids there, some of them, unreachable. But Dzhokhar? He was struggling for words. I asked Larry if it would have been like finding out that I’d been involved.

“Totally!” Larry said.

We got up and started walking toward my place about a quarter-mile away, so we could charge Larry’s cellphone. There was a message he had to return from the FBI, and he was out of juice, and who knew when he’d be able to go home again.

I am beginning to see why we have such a bad reputation when we have girls like this ^^ and there isn’t just a few of them either, there is many…. it isn’t good. 

Why cant they just stick with Justin Bieber, One Direction, or something?

The Obama Administration Killed An American Teenager Two Years Ago Today

On October 14, 2011 a remotely piloted aircraft operated by the United States launched a missile at a restaurant in Aden, Yemen, killing, among several other nearby civilians, an American citizen named Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, who was born in Denver to Yemeni-born parents and later moved with them back to Yemen.

He was 16 years old.

Al-Awlaki is one of four other American citizens killed by American drones, three of whom were not specifically targeted by U.S. counter-terrorism programs: Samir Khan, Jude Mohammed, and al-Awlaki himself.

The same series of strikes reportedly targeted, but did not kill, an al Qaeda operative named Ibrahim al-Banna.

Okay guys here you go! Don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or if there’s something you think I need to clear up.

Also, I’m keeping the friends’ timeline separate from this one because it was getting too disorganized. This timeline concerns the carjacking and Watertown shootout only. The friends’ timeline will be in another post once I’ve looked it over again.

NB - All times in figures 2 & 3 are estimates that depend on many factors that we have no way to be certain of at this time (specific route taken, driver’s speed, etc.).

Fig. 1 - APPROXIMATE CARJACKING ROUTE (based on a 2.5-hour interview with Danny)

According to Danny, the entire carjacking lasted approximately 90 minutes.

Fig. 2 - CARJACKING ROUTE RECREATION

Note: With these maps, we’re assuming direct routes to each location. In at least one case (from Brighton Ave to Watertown and back along Soldiers’ Field Road) we know that was not the case (see Fig. A above), and it’s possible it wasn’t the case with other locations as well. Therefore, think of the following times as “minimums” - the minimum approximate amount of time it would have taken to get from one point to another.

A-B: 8 mins (32 Vasser Street is the approximate location where Sean Collier was shot. 60 Brighton is where the carjacking began.) A-C: 11 mins  A-D: 12 mins (According to Danny, they turned right on Fordham (C), another right on Commonwealth (D), from Brighton)  A-E: 27 mins (Dzhokhar joined Tamerlan and Danny in the Mercedes on Fairfield Street, which is near Dexter Ave (see I on Fig. 3) (thanks patsysvodka!). According to Danny, they spent a bit of time zigzaging around Brighton and Watertown, so we know this route wasn’t direct. Based on a direct-route estimate of give or take 55 mins from Brighton Avenue to the Shell (B-H), we can gross-estimate the time they spent around Watertown and Brighton (including Dzhokhar joining them) to be in the vicinity of 90-55 = 35 minutes). A-F: 36 mins (Soldiers’ Field Road - see Fig. A) A-G: 49 mins (39 Main Street is Watertown Square, where the Bank of America Branch was located.) A-H: 63 mins (816 Memorial Drive is the Shell station where Danny escaped.) 

Fig. 3 - SHOOTOUT ROUTE RECREATION (WITH CARJACKING ROUTE)

A-I: 74 mins (So approximately 11 minutes minimum from the Shell to Dexter Street, near where the vehicle was located by police.) A-J: 74 mins (Laurel Street is where the entire shootout took place. As you can see it is very close to Dexter Street.) A-K: 76 mins(Spruce Street is where Dzhokhar abandoned the car.)

  TIMELINE

NB - All times are approximate.

DC - Dzhokhar’s complaint DI - Dzhokhar’s indictment GME - Google Maps estimate (in cases where the actual timing is not provided - these are MY OWN ESTIMATES so please take with a grain of salt!)

5:00pm - Video and photo images of “Bomber One” and “Bomber Two” are published on the FBI’s web site. DC. Pictures are widely distributed online and the public is asked to help identify the suspects. AC.

8:45pm - Dzhokhar sends a text message to Dias saying, “If you want you can go to my room and take what you want.” DI.

10:00pm - Dzhokhar and Tamerlan arm themselves with five IEDs, a Ruger P95 9mm handgun, ammo, a machete, and a hunting knife. They drive - in their Honda Civic - to MIT in Cambridge. DI.

10:25pm - Murder of Officer Sean Collier, an MIT police officer, in his cruiser near 32 Vassar Street in Cambridge. Officer Collier was shot in the head at close range by the Ruger P95 9mm. DI.

11:00pm* (DI) - Armed carjacking (allegedly by Tamerlan) of a Mercedes (also referred to as “the SUV”) around 60 Brighton Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts. According to Danny, he rolled down the window when Tamerlan approached the vehicle and tapped on it. Tamerlan then allegedly opened the door, sat in the front passenger’s seat, and showed Danny his gun before stating, “Did you hear about the Boston explosion? I did that.” He showed Danny that his gun was loaded, saying, “I am serious.” DC.

11:19pm (Approximate minimum GME based on an 11pm beginning of the carjacking) - Tamerlan forces Danny to drive to a second location (Watertown, MA - DI), where they allegedly picked up Dzhokhar (DC), who, according to Danny, had been following them in a green Honda Civic since Brighton Avenue. Dzhokhar and Tamerlan then are said to have placed guns and explosives in Danny’s car (from their Honda Civic). Tamerlan then takes over driving, Danny gets into the passenger’s seat, and Dzhokhar is in the rear passenger’s seat (therefore sitting right behind Danny). Therefore, from this point onward, according to DC, everyone is in Danny’s vehicle.

Between 11:19pm-12:00am (based on Dzhokhar being in the car when all this happened according to Danny) - Tamerlan demands money from Danny, who gives him 45$. The brothers then demanded that Danny hand over his ATM card and pin, which he did. They then drove to an ATM (Bank of America branch in Watertown Square - DI).

12:00am-12:02am (GME based on 12:15-12:17 security camera footage timing at Shell) - Dzhokhar and Tamerlan are placed by security camera footage at the ATM machine where they withdrew 800$ from the carjacking victim’s account. DC/DI.

12:15am (DI) -12:17am (DC) - They then are placed, once again by security cam footage, at the Shell convenience store (816 Memorial Drive, Cambridge) where Dzhokhar got out to make a purchase. During this time, DC states that Tamerlan and Dzhokhar were both out of the car, while according to Danny, Tamerlan and Danny were both still in the vehicle. Regardless, this is when Danny escaped (at approximately 12:15am according to DI).

12:26am (approximate minimum GME based on the DIRECT distance between the Shell and Dexter Street (assuming a time of 12:15 for the previous point). It is very possible their route was not direct and so this technically could have occurred anywhere between 12:26 and 12:43) - The stolen vehicle is located in Watertown, MA.

12:43am - At least two IEDs are thrown out of the car toward police on Dexter Street. Shootout on Laurel Street ensues. DI.

12:45am - The Shell gas station where Danny escaped is roped off by police. DI.

12:50am - Tamerlan runs out of ammunition and is apprehended by police. Dzhokhar allegedly reenters the Mercedes and drives it directly toward the officers, barely missing Sgt. Pugliese and running over his brother in the process. DI.

12:52am** (GME) - Dzhokhar abandons the Mercedes on Spruce Street in Watertown and smashes both of his cell phones.