State Senator calls for help to bury Boston bomber- Man accused of lying about bombing seeks release

Published May 05, 2013

FoxNews.com

A Massachusetts state senator says the federal government should intervene in the quest to find a final resting place for the elder Boston Marathon bomber.

State Sen. Harriet L. Chandler, D-Worcester, said Uncle Sam needs to alleviate a Wochester funeral home’s onerous burden of having accepted Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s corpse on Friday after it was released by the state medical examiner.

Peter Stefan, owner of the Graham, Putnam and Mahoney Funeral Parlors has told The Boston Herald his business has been beset by protesters since accepting the body, and he cannot book any new business until convincing a cemetery to provide a plot for the body.

 “The federal government needs to step in,” said Chandler. “But I’m not sure what they’re going to do or where will they go. Peter Stefan is a very respected and respectable funeral home director in Worcester. He’s a good man. This can’t continue. He’s taking a financial loss as a result of this.”

Stefan accepted Tsarnaev’s body Friday after it was initially sent to a North Attleborough funeral home, where it was greeted by about 20 protesters.

“We have a body for burial that has caused a lot of controversy and we can’t continue to play this game,” Stefan told The Herald.  “Under normal circumstances, the government would say it’s (the funeral parlor’s) responsibility to find a place for burial, but this is not normal circumstances. This is a nightmare.

"My problem here is trying to find a gravesite,” Stefan added. “A lot of people don't want to do it. They don't want to be involved with this. I keep bringing up the point of Lee Harvey Oswald, Timothy McVeigh or Ted Bundy. Somebody had to do those, too."

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BOSTON BOMBING: Coach: No Way Defeat Turned Boxer Into Bomber

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  FILE - In this May 4, 2009 file photo, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, left, fights Lamar Fenner of Chicago, in the 201 weight class, during the 2009 Golden Gloves National Boxing Tournament at the Salt Palace, Monday, May 4, 2009. Tsameav was identified as a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings. Tsarnaev, who had been known to the FBI as Suspect No. 1 and was seen in surveillance footage in a black baseball cap, was killed overnight Thursday during a getaway attempt, officials said. On Friday, April 19, 2013, thousands of officers were swarming the streets in and around Boston hunting for Tsarnaev's younger brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19. (AP Photo/The Salt Lake Tribune, Rick Egan) DESERET NEWS OUT; LOCAL TV OUT; MAGS OUTTHE ASSOCIATED PRESS2013

The Boston Marathon bomber’s former boxing coach says his one-time pupil may have been dispirited by boxing setbacks, but that’s no reason for the attacks that killed three people and injured more than 200.

The coach is clear: Don’t blame Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s metamorphosis from a seemingly well-adjusted American immigrant – with dreams of one day representing the U.S. in the Olympics – into a radicalized killer on amateur boxing.

“That’s ridiculous,” Bob Russo, 58, of Portland, Maine, tells FoxNews.com.  “You can’t tie the sport of amateur boxing -- that has helped so many immigrants and unfortunate people -- to his transition to radical Islam.

“It’s a reach.  It takes more than that. I didn’t look at him that closely, the Facebook stuff and all that. But he just seemed like a typical refugee kid, (when I knew him). It’s a reach that amateur boxing dashed his dreams and caused this tragedy.”

“You can’t tie the sport of amateur boxing . . . to his transition to radical Islam."

- Bob Russo

According to The New York Times, Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s transition from a promising pugilist – with a flair for the dramatic – into the Boston Bomber can be traced to two seminal events concerning his boxing career.

The paper reports Tsarnaev won the 2009 New England Golden Gloves Championships for the 201-pound division, progressing to the organization’s Tournament of Champions, held that year in Salt Lake City.

There, Tsarnaev reportedly lost a close decision to the late Lamar Fenner, of Chicago. “It was a close fight, but close is close and you either win or lose it,” Russo tells FoxNews.com. “My opinion was that he had the edge, and most people felt that way, but it wasn’t like they robbed him. I don’t consider it a major robbery.

“As I recall, he was fine, disappointed like everyone else, but fine, and not a bad sport. After he lost, we as a team stayed together and cheered each other on. He was around. He didn’t seem desperately disappointed or crazy, or anything like that.”

The Times reports Tsarnaev again won the New England Championship in 2010, but a rule change enacted by the Golden Gloves that year disqualified him from participating in the Tournament of Champions, or at least until the Russian-born immigrant secured his American citizenship. 

“It was a blow the immigrant boxer could not withstand,” writes The Times in a report published Sunday.

However, Russo -- the co-coach of the 2009 New England team and the current director of New England Golden Gloves -- says that he would have made the same decision had he been in charge.

Prior to 2010, the Golden Gloves allowed non-citizens, like Tsarnaev, to participate in the national championship, unless it was an Olympic year. Usually, winning the nationals secured the victor a tryout for the Olympic team on an Olympic year. But the old Golden Gloves policy, says Russo, resulted in confusion, controversy and numerous grievances on the part of both American and foreign fighters.

“It caused problems,” says Russo. “In the years the Golden Gloves would allow [non-citizens] into the nationals, the local guys didn’t want to fight their fighter against them because they felt the non-citizens shouldn’t have qualified in the first place. It was kind of a rule that needed to be cleared up and definitive. Yes or no. The Golden Gloves finally decided ‘no’ because it was causing chaos and confusion.”

The Times reports that following the rule-change prohibiting Tsarnaev from competing in the 2010 Golden Gloves nationals, his life quickly changed, as he became an increasingly fervent advocate of radical Islam.

“Hell no!” says Russo. “He was a typical immigrant kid who was quiet and it takes a while for everyone to fit in and he had a thick accent. I’ve dealt with many immigrants in my career, and they all kind of seem like that. They’re hard working, old school. It’s a huge reach that amateur boxing caused all of this. A huge one.”

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Bombing victim's tough choice: Keep damaged foot or amputate lower leg

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  Heather Abbott, of Newport, R.I., responds to questions from reporters during a news conference at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston. Abbott underwent a below the knee amputation during surgery on her left leg following injuries she sustained at the Boston Marathon bombings on April 15.AP Photo/Steven Senne

A week after a Boston Marathon bomb put Heather Abbott in a local hospital, the Rhode Island woman faced a difficult decision: try to keep her badly wounded foot, or have her leg amputated below the knee.

She picked the second option, viewing life with a prosthesis as the most assured path back to the active lifestyle she lived before the April 15 bombings. The 38-year-old said she likes to run and take aerobic and Zumba classes. She wanted to try "yoga paddle boarding" this summer.

She now has her sights set on next year.

"I really think I'm going to be able to live my life in a normal way, eventually, when I get that permanent prosthesis," Abbott said, speaking at Brigham and Women's Hospital.

Addressing media Thursday from a bed wheeled into a hospital conference center, Ms. Abbott was also clear-eyed about the challenges of rehabilitation and the pain she may endure along the way. Additionally, she said has been focused on her recovery and not news about the bombing suspects—Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and his brother, Tamerlan, who died following a shootout with the police last week.

"I haven't thought much about them at all," Abbott said. "I don't even know how to pronounce their names."

The two bombs on Monday injured 264 people, according to the Boston Public Health Commission, and led more than a dozen, including Abbott, to endure amputations. She is one of the most recent people to join that list, highlighting the tenuous situation some patients have faced following efforts to save damaged limbs.

A patient at Massachusetts General Hospital also underwent an amputation within the last week, a spokesman said.

In Abbott's case, she needed vascular repair to try to restore blood flow to her foot, and follow-up evaluations indicated she still had to consider the option to amputate. Doctors always try to leave this up to patients, said Eric Bluman, Abbott's orthopedic surgeon, but they also explained the potential limitations of a foot that may never heal.

Meantime, the hospital also introduced the patient to other amputees, including war veterans, to give Abbott a view into her possible future.

With a "very badly mangled" foot, she said, she wouldn't be able to live the lifestyle she did before the injury.

Click for more from The Wall Street Journal.

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BOSTON BOMBING: Suspects' Dad Faces FBI, Says Sons Were Framed

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  The parents of Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Anzor and Zubeidat Tsarnaev, will be interviewed by U.A. authorities regarding the Boston Marathon bombing on April 15 that killed three people and injured nearly 200 others. (AP)

U.S. authorities were on their way to a mountainous region in southern Russia to interview the parents of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects, as more details emerged about the brothers' recent activities in the U.S., including word of where the deadly explosives may have been purchased and that the family relied on welfare for at least some of their time here.

A U.S. Embassy official said the Americans traveled from Moscow to the predominantly Muslim province of Dagestan "because the investigation is ongoing, it's not over."

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said Wednesday that the team is working with the Russian security services, the FSB.

The mother of Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is being interviewed Wednesday in the FSB building in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan.

The official said one positive development from the Boston tragedy might be closer cooperation with the Russian government on security issues.

Meanwhile, new information surfaced Wednesday about the older of the two brothers, as the manager of a New Hampshire fireworks store said 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev was seen buying two mortar kits at the store in February.

April Walton, of Phantom Fireworks, says Tamerlan bought two "Lock and Load" reloadable mortar kits with 24 shells each.

Company Vice President William Weimer says FBI agents visited the Seabrook store on Friday, interviewed staff and checked its computers.

He says the amount of gunpowder that could be harvested from the kits would not have been enough to detonate the Boston bombs.

Walton says Tsarnaev paid $200 cash but scanned his driver's license into the company's computer system as required by store policy. Walton says the employee who handled the sale described it as a routine transaction.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev was also living on taxpayer-funded state welfare benefits while he was "delving deep" into the world of radical anti-American Islamism, the Boston Herald reports.

State officials confirmed to the newspaper late Tuesday that Tsarnaev, who was killed during a gun battle with police on Friday, was receiving benefits along with his wife, Katherine Russell Tsarnaev, and their 3-year-old daughter. 

The state’s Executive Office of Health and Human Services said those benefits ended in 2012 when the couple stopped meeting income eligibility limits. Russell Tsarnaev’s attorney has claimed Katherine — who had converted to Islam — was working up to 80 hours a week as a home health aide while Tsarnaev stayed at home, the newspaper reports.

“The brothers were not receiving transitional assistance benefits at the time of the incident and have not received any transitional assistance benefits this year," Massachusetts Health and Human Services communication director Alec Loftus told the newspaper in a statement. "The Tsarnaevs’ parents are former recipients of transitional assistance benefits, and both Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev received benefits through their parents when they were younger. Separately, Tamerlan and his family received benefits until 2012, when the family became ineligible based on their income.”

Meanwhile, the body of Tamerlan Tsarnaev has reportedly not been claimed by either his parents or his 24-year-old widow.

ABC News reported Tuesday that medical examiners had completed their autopsy and the body is ready to be claimed for burial, but so far no one has done so.

Lawyers for Russell Tsarnaev have said she "is doing everything she can to assist with the investigation," and is mourning the victims of the bombings.

The area near the Boston Marathon finish line also reopened to the general public early Wednesday. Traffic was allowed to flow all the way down Boylston Street for the first time since two explosions on April 15 killed three spectators and hospitalized 260 others.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Click for more from the Boston Herald.

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TAX-FUNDED JIHAD?Boston Bombing Suspect Reportedly Got Welfare

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One of the men behind last week's deadly attack on the Boston Marathon had received Massachusetts welfare benefits until recently -- during the same period that the alienation he apparently felt as a Chechen in America coincided with a growing embrace of radical Islam.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, and his family were living on taxpayer-funded state welfare benefits as recently as last year, the Boston Herald reports, though it remains unclear what kind of benefits they were receiving.

State officials confirmed to the newspaper late Tuesday that Tsarnaev, who was killed during a gun battle with police on Friday, was receiving benefits along with his wife, Katherine Russell Tsarnaev, and their 3-year-old daughter.

His younger brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, was captured Friday night and charged with using a weapon of mass destruction. The 19-year-old could face the death penalty if convicted.

The state’s Executive Office of Health and Human Services said Tamerlan Tsarnaev's welfare benefits ended in 2012 when the family stopped meeting income eligibility limits. His wife's attorney has claimed Katherine -- who had converted to Islam -- was working up to 80 hours a week as a home health aide while Tsarnaev stayed at home, the newspaper reports.

“The brothers were not receiving transitional assistance benefits at the time of the incident and have not received any transitional assistance benefits this year," Massachusetts Health and Human Services communication director Alec Loftus told the newspaper in a statement. "The Tsarnaevs’ parents are former recipients of transitional assistance benefits, and both Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev received benefits through their parents when they were younger. Separately, Tamerlan and his family received benefits until 2012, when the family became ineligible based on their income.”

The Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance works "to assist low-income individuals and families to meet their basic needs, increase their incomes and improve their quality of life," the agency's website says.

The benefits offered include food assistance, job assistance, emergency shelter, help for victims of domestic violence, cash aid for families with children, emergency assistance for the elderly and disabled.

Loftus declined to specify to the Herald the type and amount of assistance Tsarnaev and his family were receiving.

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CHEERING ON A FRIEND: Family Mourns Daughter, 29, Killed in Bombing

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  April 15, 2013: This undated photo provided by the family shows Krystle Campbell. Campbell, 29, a restaurant manager from Medford, Mass., was among the people killed in the explosions at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, in Boston.AP

A 29-year-old restaurant manager has been identified as one of three people killed in the bombing at the Boston Marathon.

Her father says Krystle Campbell, of Medford, Mass., had gone with her best friend to take a picture of the friend's boyfriend crossing the finish line on Monday afternoon.

William Campbell says his daughter, who worked at Jimmy's Steakhouse in nearby Arlington, was "very caring, very loving person, and was daddy's little girl." He says the loss has devastated the family.

"Mr. Campbell said that she certainly was a dream daughter, the daughter that every dream to have and friends of hers said that she was eager about life," Medford Mayor Michael McGlynn said. 

Campbell's friend was seriously injured in the explosion.

Campbell's family told the New York Post that they were initially informed that she had survived the blast. It wasn't until family members arrived at the hospital that they realized the friend who survived the blast had been mistakenly identified as her. 

"They’re just viewing the body now. And we're just devastated,” Liese Reilly, a relative told The Post. “I can’t even begin to understand what just happened.”

An 8-year-old, Martin Richard of Boston, also died. He was at the finish line watching the race with his family. 

Boston University says a graduate student at the school was killed in the bombings

In a statement late Tuesday afternoon, the school said it was not releasing the name or any other information about the student, pending permission from the family.

The statement says the student was with two friends who were watching the race at the finish line, not far from the university's campus. One of the friends, also a grad student at the university, was injured and is at Boston Medical Center in stable condition.

The twin blasts killed at least three people and injured 176 -- including 17 in critical condition, authorities said today.

Click for more from The New York Post.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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White House Believes Deadly Boston Marathon Bombing 'An Act of Terror'

DEVELOPING: Multiple casualties are reported after at least two explosions rocked the area near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, according to the Boston Herald. 

Witnesses reportedly heard booms that sounded like two claps of thunder near the finish line inside the Fairmount Copley Plaza Hotel. 

The explosions occurred just before 3 p.m. Video of the scene showed a number of emergency crews in the area tending to victims and blood on the ground near the finish line. 

"I saw two explosions. The first one was beyond the finish line. I heard a loud bang and I saw smoke rising," Boston Herald reporter Chris Cassidy, who was running in the marathon, told the newspaper. "I kept running and I heard behind me a loud bang. It looked like it was in a trash can or something...There are people who have been hit with debris, people with bloody foreheads.”

A photographer with Fox affiliate WFXT reported seeing a number of victims with lost limbs.

Competitors and race organizers were crying as they fled the chaos. Bloody spectators were being carried to the medical tent that had been set up to care for fatigued runners.

"There are a lot of people down," said one man, whose bib No. 17528 identified him as Frank Deruyter of North Carolina. He was not injured, but marathon workers were carrying one woman, who did not appear to be a runner, to the medical area as blood gushed from her leg. A Boston police officer was wheeled from the course with a leg injury that was bleeding.

About three hours after the winners crossed the line, there was a loud explosion on the north side of Boylston Street, just before the photo bridge that marks the finish line. Another thunderous explosion could be heard a few seconds later.

Runner Laura McLean of Toronto said she heard two explosions outside the medical tent.

"There are people who are really, really bloody," McLean said. "They were pulling them into the medical tent."

Cherie Falgoust was waiting for her husband, who was running the race.  "I was expecting my husband any minute," she said. "I don't know what this building is ... it just blew. Just a big bomb, a loud boom, and then glass everywhere. Something hit my head. I don't know what it was. I just ducked."

Click for more from MyFoxBoston.com

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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