WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — On Friday, a Boston jury sentenced Tsarnaev to death on six counts for the Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013, despite the defense’s attempts to avoid the death penalty by arguing that Dzhokhar was influenced by his radical brother Tamerlan.
"We condemn the bombings that took place in Boston two years ago, and we mourn the loss of life and grave injuries they caused,” Amnesty International said in a statement on Friday.
“The death penalty, however, is not justice. It will only compound the violence, and it will not deter others from committing similar crimes in the future.”
The US state of Massachusetts declared the death penalty unconstitutional in 1984, however, Tsarnaev was tried under US federal law because of the gravity of his crimes.
The advocacy group said that it was “outrageous” of the US federal government to impose the death penalty “when the people of Massachusetts have abolished it in their state.”
“As death sentences decline worldwide, no government can claim to be a leader in human rights when it sentences its prisoners to death.”
Although the advocacy group has documented a decline in death sentences in the United States, there is still no evidence that proves capital punishment has an effect on “reducing terrorism,” according to the statement.
The United States is one of nine countries in the world that has carried out executions every year between 2009 and 2013, while 140 countries have moved to abolish the death penalty in law or practice, according to Amnesty International.
On April 15, 2013, three people were killed and more than 250 injured after Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev planted two bombs near the finish line of the Boston Marathon. Tamerlan was killed in a shootout with police after the bombing.
