. . . two days ago, on Monday, but I was in DC for the same sex marriage arguments at the Supreme Court. I returned to the Boston courtroom today.
Until now the focus of the defense had been almost exclusively on Dzhokhar’s older brother Tamerlane.
Today we heard from a paramedic who worked on Tamerlan shortly before he died who testified the the older Tsarnaev was combative, even when mortally wounded. And then from a paramedic who treated Dzhokhar after he climbed out of the boat and surrendered. She said Dzhokhar put up no fight.
After that it was a string of character witnesses – teachers and friends who knew a different Tsarnaev than the one sitting in the courtroom today. All of them were on the stand a very short time.
So it wasn’t an uninteresting day, but nothing unexpected. I’ll just post the rest of today’s drawings and call it a day.
Courtroom sketching is a form of visual journalism or reportage drawing that is slowly dying out. Where once upon a time news organization each had their own artist covering a story, today a “pool” artist often sketches for all. It is a demanding and stressful discipline where the drawing is often done directly and under tight deadline.
After forty-five years of news sketching in courtrooms and congress I’m calling it quits. It’s been sometimes fun, sometimes frustrating, almost always interesting. I’ve been lucky to work with some really great people. Don’t think I’ll miss it, but a little scared of not having a deadline.
While I won’t be sketching in court anymore, I may continue to post to this blog from time to time. Not sure what that might be. I’m about to start a new assignment documenting infrastructure and construction. Could be interesting.
Interesting insight here – how Tsarnaev did have friends who are now having to testify like this. Defense seems to be doing well for what it has.