WASHINGTON, May 1 (RIA Novosti) – Relatives of deceased Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev will claim his body after his widow said she would like her husband’s remains to be released to his side of the family, Tsarnaev’s uncle was quoted by US media as saying.
“Of course, family members will take possession of the body,” his uncle, Ruslan Tsarni of Maryland, told The Associated Press on Tuesday night. “We'll do it. We will do it. A family is a family.”
His comments follow a statement Tuesday by the lawyer of Tsarnaev’s widow, Katherine Russell, who said the woman would not claim his body.
“It is Katherine Russell's wish that his remains be released to the Tsarnaev family, and we will communicate her wishes to the proper authorities,” attorney Amato DeLuca said in a statement Tuesday, adding that his client, who is currently living in Rhode Island, is providing “as much assistance to the investigation as she can.”
DeLuca said Russell “and her family continue to be deeply saddened by the harm that has been caused.”
Tsarnaev’s parents are still in Russia but there are other relatives living in the United States, including Ruslan Tsarni.
Tsarnaev, 26, died in an April 19 shootout with police in the Boston suburb of Watertown following a massive police manhunt for him and his brother, Dzhokhar, whom authorities accuse of planting bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon days earlier that killed three people and injured more than 250.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, was badly injured in the manhunt but evaded police for hours after his brother's death until he was apprehended in Watertown. His medical condition has stabilized, and he has been charged with using "a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death."
Terrel Harris, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Department of Public Safety, told the AP on Tuesday evening that the state had not yet received Russell's request to release Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s body.
Harris could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.
An uncle of the two suspects contacted a mosque to inquire about arranging a burial for Tamerlan Tsarnaev shortly after he was killed, Fox News cited the Islamic Society of Boston as saying.
