'My brother made me do it': Boston 'bomber' reveals

 

The surviving Boston Marathon bombing suspect has told investigators that his brother orchestrated the attacks because he 'wanted to defend Islam from attack', it emerged today.

But in scrawled notes made from his hospital bed, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, told Guantanamo Bay interrogators that he and his brother were not linked to any Islamic terrorist groups.

According to CNN, Dzhokhar said his older brother, Tamerlan, 26, was the ringleader in the attacks that shook the nation a week ago, but that the pair were working alone.

In preliminary interviews with Dzhokhar, the terror suspect said his brother 'wanted to defend Islam from attack', a source told CNN.
Two U.S. officials said last night the evidence from the bedside interrogation suggests the terror suspects did not have any accomplices, despite previous fears they were part of a 12-man terror 'sleeper cell.'

One of the brothers, Tamerlan, 26, died in a police shootout on Friday. The other brother, Dzhokhar, 19, was formally charged today with conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction after being questioned by federal officials in his hospital room where he is recovering from multiple injuries.

He could face a death sentence, despite the fact Massachusetts has no death penalty, as he is being prosecuted under the federal system.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler described the 19-year-old as 'alert, mentally competent and lucid,' during a brief initial court appearance in his Boston hospital room. He communicated mostly by nodding his head but at one point answered 'no,' according to CNN. A probably cause hearing has been scheduled for May 30.

Investigators have been quizzing Tsarnaev about whether there were more bombs, explosives or weapons beyond the ones already uncovered by police as well as who came up with the plot.

dailymail