Prosecutors in the trial of accused Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev tried to discredit their own witness Wednesday, when it became apparent her findings did not support the government’s charges that the suspect murdered Officer Sean Collier.
Jennifer Montgomery, a forensic DNA analyst from the Massachusetts State Police Crime Laboratory, told the court she found none of Collier’s blood on Tsarnaev’s sweatshirt, despite swabbing bloodstains from the abdomen, cuffs, sleeves, elbow region, and back of the garment.
Montgomery says she tested the sweatshirt against Collier’s DNA: “He could not have been a source of the DNA on those items” @NECN #Tsarnaev
— Alysha Palumbo (@AlyshaNECN) March 18, 2015
The government has been going all out to prove it was Tsarnaev who pulled the trigger on Collier – bringing in Stephen Silva, a former friend of the alleged bomber, who testified Tuesday that he supplied Tsarnaev with the gun that ended Collier’s life.
Last week, an eyewitness identified Tsarnaev as the person he saw ‘leaning into Collier’s cruiser’ moments after the officer was shot. Collier’s blood was also found on gloves recovered from the floor of Tsarnaev’s car. However, CCTV footage taken shortly after the murder shows Tsarnaev’s clothing to be completely free of any bloodstaining or spatter – at odds with evidence photos of the inside of Collier’s car and the ‘bloodbath’ described by officers who initially responded to the scene.
Defense attorneys maintain it was Tsarnaev’s brother, Tamerlan, who killed Officer Collier. Sensing a gaping hole in their story, prosecutor William Weinreb became hostile to Montgomery, suggesting her forensic examination of the sweatshirt may not have been as thorough as she had previously testified.
Weinreb: You don’t know if every single droplet of blood on that sweatshirt was tested? Montgomery: They weren’t. #Tsarnaev
— Jim Armstrong (@JimArmstrongWBZ) March 18, 2015
Montgomery, an experienced investigator with over 10 years service, was forced to concede “they weren’t” – despite it being clear all pertinent areas of the sweatshirt had been subjected to testing.
Timothy Watkins, one of Tsarnaev’s defense lawyers, pounced on Montgomery:
Defense points out Montgomery testified she trusted her coworker Waite’s ability to collect blood @NECN #Tsarnaev
— Alysha Palumbo (@AlyshaNECN) March 18, 2015
When prosecutors would rather flip on their own witness in pursuit of a conviction based on limited evidence, they strain all credulity.
But will the jury have noticed?
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Through the entire trial this kid has shown no remorse over what he and his brother did. He seems apathetic and bored. Jurors watch this kind of body language and it does not bode well if he wants to live.
He’s already been tried and convicted in the media. What is worse it the people didn’t object at all. No proof. Could not get anymore gullible.
Barbara Starr might make a good witness. She has been interviewed on TV twice as an unnamed eye witness to the bombing and to the Tsarnaev capture.
Does Tsarnaev understand that his own attorney already said he was guilty? Or maybe he doesn’t speak English so he has no idea what’s being said in his “defense”?
WhoWhatWhy readers – we need to get stories like this out to people living in Boston. Maybe we can post to online newspapers and any other Boston forum out there we can find.
But we are just getting associated with all the people saying it is all a hoax. Everytime some big shooting takes place or something like Boston, it’s now being called “fake”. Who benefits from that pov? Seems it helps those who like shutting down our free society.
Great comments,
The prosecution’s rush to trial while the pain and fear of this event is still at a high point has destroyed their ability to understand the evidence that they are presenting. Yet the defense appears to know next to nothing of the evidence being presented, and lacks any ability to counter the suspect evidence.
I don’t want to see a killer go loose, but I also don’t want my government and it’s agencies to misrepresent evidence against any individual. In this case they have done just that, and the defense has done nothing. Sad
Um they don’t even need to prove he pulled the trigger to convict him but why let facts stop you
This, imo, illustrates the desperation of the prosecution in this case and also that a conviction is of course their objective. Did the principles of “truth” and “justice” ever have a place in the US justice system or is this simply a fable?
“But will the jury have noticed?” – It is my only hope with the way this trial is going.
My hope too!
I’m sure the Jury has been thoroughly checked over to ensure guilty and death verdicts. Very few Americans these days seem to be aware of the massive corruption in all these “intelligence” bodies of taxpayer funded organizations.
Exactly, can you imagine the sheer hell a jury who found him innocent would go through? Holder and DOJ would start a BS investigation into anything that does not go along with this gov’t psyop.
They would label the juror a terrorist.
Then drone they ass walking out of a McDonalds