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Boston Marathon bombings suspect No 2 taken into custody

by Staff Reporter
19 Apr 2013 at 18:00hrs | Views
The teenage suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings has been taken into custody in a suburb of the city, police have said.

Gunfire was heard as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, was reportedly found hiding in a boat in a backyard in Watertown.

He had escaped on foot early on Friday after a police shootout that claimed the life of his elder brother, 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

Three people died and more than 170 were hurt in Monday's bombings.

A law enforcement official told the Associated Press news agency that the suspect was covered in blood.

Police helicopters buzzed overhead, and bomb squad vans and ambulances were in position around the house in Franklin Street in Watertown on Friday night.

At one stage a series of about 15 explosions erupted, which local television channels speculated could have been flash-bang grenades.

A local resident, Anna Bedirian, told Reuters news agency: "There's about 50 guys there with machine guns and they all got bulletproof vests on, some of them are holding shields.

"There are a couple of armoured cars and they're all standing around."

Friday night's breakthrough came less than an hour after authorities lifted a city-wide order for residents to stay indoors, and reopened the mass transit system, as the trail appeared to have gone cold.

Thousands of Swat team officers scoured the streets all day in a manhunt that virtually shut down the city.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, a college student, had fled on foot following a gun battle that left 200 spent rounds and a car chase in which he and his brother hurled explosives at police, authorities said.

The brothers also shot and killed a university policeman and severely wounded another officer late on Thursday, authorities said, hours after the FBI released images of marathon-bombing suspects.

Law enforcement officials and family members have identified the Tsarnaev brothers as ethnic Chechens who had been living in America for about a decade.

The FBI interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011 after a request from a foreign government, US law enforcements officials have confirmed. But agents closed the case after finding no reason for concern.

Monday's attack killed Martin Richard, aged eight, Krystle Campbell, 29, and Lu Lingzi, 23, a postgraduate student from China.

Source - BBC