After one of the most closely watched trials in recent U.S. history, a federal jury found Tsarnaev guilty Wednesday in the 2013 terror attack that killed three people and wounded more than 260. He kept his hands folded in front of him and looked down at the defense table as the guilty verdicts were read.
The jury will now decide whether the 21-year-old former student should be sentenced to death or receive life in prison.
Tsarnaev is an ethnic Chechen who moved to the U.S. with his family about a decade before the bombings.
Tsarnaev's conviction was widely expected, given his lawyer's startling admission during opening statements that he took part in the bombing. But the lawyer also argued that Tsarnaev's older brother, Tamerlan, 26, masterminded the attack and enlisted his then-19-year-old brother to help.
Prosecutors allege that the conspiracy between the Tsarnaev brothers began in February 2013 - two months before the marathon bombings - and continued through April 19, 2013, when Dzhokhar was captured. They say the conspiracy covered the bombings, an MIT security officer's death and a firefight the Tsarnaevs had with police in Watertown. Tamerlan was killed during the gunbattle.
Prosecutors used their closing to remind the jury of the horror of that day, showing photographs and video of the carnage and chaos after the shrapnel-packed pressure-cooker bombs exploded. In one video, jurors could hear the agonizing screams of Krystle Campbell, a 29-year-old restaurant manager who bled to death on the sidewalk. Another woman and an 8-year-old boy also were killed.
A prosecutor told the jury that Tsarnaev made a coldblooded decision aimed at punishing America for its wars in Muslim countries.
