Boston bombing suspects moved, NYC plot revealed
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev released from hospital, transferred to medical detention; Investigators reveal brothers planned Times Square attack
The surviving Boston Marathon bombings suspect has been released from a civilian hospital and transferred to a federal medical detention center in central Massachusetts.
In the meanwhile, authorities revealed that the brothers were headed for New York's Times Square to blow up the rest of their explosives, in what they portrayed as a chilling, spur-of-the-moment scheme that fell apart when they realized the car they had hijacked was low on gas.
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The US Marshals Service said Friday that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev left Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center overnight and was taken to the Federal Medical Center Devens about 40 miles (65 kilometers) west of Boston.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (Photo: AP)
The facility, on the decommissioned Fort Devens US Army base, treats federal prisoners and detainees who require specialized long-term medical or mental health care.
The 19-year-old Tsarnaev is recovering from a gunshot wound to the throat and other injuries suffered during his attempted getaway.
Tsarnaev hiding (Photo: Reuters)
The Massachusetts college student was charged with setting off the shrapnel-packed bombs that killed three people and wounded more than 260 at the marathon finish line on Apr. 15.
Bombing victim Martin Richard, Tsarnaev and bomb
New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev told interrogators from his hospital bed that he and his older brother had decided spontaneously last week to drive to New York and launch an attack. In their stolen sport utility vehicle they had five pipe bombs and a pressure-cooker explosive like the ones that blew up at the marathon, Kelly said.
"New York City was next on their list of targets," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.
The plan fell apart when the Tsarnaev brothers got into a shootout just outside Boston that left Tamerlan Tsarnaev dead, Kelly said.
"We don't know if we would have been able to stop the terrorists had they arrived here from Boston," New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. "We're just thankful that we didn't have to find out that answer."
Boston celebrating end of manhunt (Photo: AFP)
Christina DiIorio-Sterling, a spokeswoman for US Attorney Carmen Ortiz in Boston, would not comment on whether authorities plan to add charges based on alleged plan to attack New York.
The Middlesex County district attorney's office also is building a murder case against the surviving Tsarnaev for the death of Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier three days after the bombings, office spokeswoman Stephanie Guyotte said.
Investigators and lawmakers briefed by the FBI have said that the Tsarnaev brothers – ethnic Chechens from Russia who had lived in the US for about a decade – were motivated by anger over the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Based on the younger man's interrogation and other evidence, authorities have said it appears so far that the Muslim brothers were radicalized via jihadi material on the Internet instead of by any direct contact with terrorist organizations, but they have said it is still an open question.
Dzhokhar was interrogated in his hospital room over a period of 16 hours without being read his constitutional rights. He immediately stopped talking after a magistrate judge and a representative from the US Attorney's office entered the room and advised him of his rights to keep quiet and seek a lawyer, according to a US law enforcement official and others briefed on the interrogation.
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