“Tamerlan says he doesn’t drink or smoke anymore: ‘God said no alcohol.’ A muslim, he says: ‘There are no values anymore,’ and worries that ‘people can’t control themselves.'”
“Everything We Know About Tamerlan Tsarnaev, Dead Bombing Suspect,” by Timothy Burke at Deadspin, April 19:
Authorities are now confirming the two suspects sought in Monday’s Boston Marathon bombing are two Russian-born Chechen brothers, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev. Tamerlan, the older brother, is dead. Here’s what we know about him.
It’s not much, and most of it’s derived from a photo gallery. We know Tamerlan Tsarnaev was 26 and a competitive boxer for a club named Team Lowell, who won the Rocky Marciano Trophy for being New England Golden Gloves heavyweight champion in 2010. He did this while taking time off from school at Bunker Hill Community College, where he studied in hopes of being an engineer.
We know he had a YouTube profile, where he created a playlist dedicated to terrorism. The photo gallery features his girlfriend at the time, and the caption reads:
Tamerlan says his girlfriend is half Portuguese, half Italian girlfriend and converted to Islam: “She’s beautiful, man!”
Other photo captions in the gallery:
Tamerlan demonstrates a way of walking to strengthen the ankle muscles at the Wai Kru Mixed Martial Arts center. A native of Chechnya, Tamerlan says: “In Russia, we used to train like this. Here nobody does it, I don’t know why!”
Tamerlan says he doesn’t drink or smoke anymore: “God said no alcohol.” A muslim, he says: “There are no values anymore,” and worries that “people can’t control themselves.”
Tamerlan says he doesn’t usually take his shirt off so girls don’t get bad ideas: “I’m very religious.”