Keller @ Large: Why The Tsarnaev Trial Should Be In Boston
BOSTON (CBS) - I would prefer to not be writing about the trial of accused Boston Marathon mass murderer Dzhokhar Tsarnaev for the second time in three days, believe me.
My stomach turns every time I think about the case.
But I cannot leave unrebutted the Globe op-ed piece by the outgoing and incoming presidents of the Massachusetts Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers denouncing the decision of Judge George O'Toole to keep the trial here.
The core of their argument is that the Tsarnaev case is "unique," not your typical murder of innocent bystanders and a police officer.
"In this case," they write, " the city of Boston itself…was a victim," along with "everyone who ever attended a Marathon; everyone who ever cheered as a friend or relative ran the race; everyone who watched the events on television. And even if the Marathon itself did not have an impact on every man, woman, and child in Boston and its environs, the pursuit and capture of the defendant did."
Their conclusion: "A victim cannot be a dispassionate decision-maker in the trial of the crime in which he or she was victimized."
News flash for these defense attorneys: violent crimes like these victimize us all every time they happen.
The vicious, random murder of pizza deliveryman Richel Nova terrified the region; I wasn't the only one in the newsroom crying at my desk as his daughters delivered their victim-impact statements.
It is insulting – and indicative of the lengths the defense bar will go to obstruct justice for their clients – for these lawyers to assert that a local jury can't fairly assess the evidence against Tsarnaev.
And that, as Judge O'Toole noted in his ruling, is all the Constitution obligates us to do.
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You can listen to Keller At Large on WBZ News Radio every weekday at 7:55 a.m. You can also watch Jon on WBZ-TV News.
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