A Year Before Bombings, Katherine Russell Googled "Rewards for Wife of Mujahadeen"

By MARK SCHIELDROP

More than a year before the Boston Marathon Bombings, the wife of now-dead Tamerlan Tsarnaev, Katherine Russell, was Googling “rewards for wife of mujahedeen” and “if your husband becomes a shahid, what are the rewards for you?”

Russell, who had an upper middle class upbringing in Rhode Island and graduated from North Kingstown High School, was one focus of testimony Tuesday in the trial of her brother-in-law, Dzhokar Tsarnaev, who is hoping for a life sentence and to be spared the death penalty.

>>> See also: Boston Marathon Bombing Trial: Testimonies Detail Tamerlan’s Transformation

Lawyers for the convicted bomber are trying to portray their client as the victim of brainwashing and coercion on the part of his older brother.

The Internet searches by Russell, the defense argues, suggest that even she played a role in grooming him towards a radicalized act of mass destruction.

Mark Spencer, a computer expert, revealed the information in court as he testified for the defense.

Her friend, Gina Crawford, testified that Russell, on the day of the bombings, texted “a lot more people are killed every day in Syria and other places” in response to her inquiry if she were OK.

The revelations in court also raise more questions about whether Russell could face charges for her alleged role in the plot. In March, law enforcement sources hinted that she could face charges of misprision of a felony, or failing to let authorities know that a crime was about to happen.

There has been speculation that Russell, who grew up in an affluent neighborhood in North Kingstown and married Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2010, had to have known that some kind of carnage was about to happen. She lived in a small apartment in Cambridge with her husband and pressure cookers and explosives in plain view.

Russell, who graduated from North Kingstown High School in 2007, has since moved to New Jersey with her family, including a young daughter. The family’s home in the Quidnessett neighborhood, which was the site of a media circus in the days following the bombings, has since been sold.

Her lawyer, Amato DeLuca, said that Russell was working 80 hour weeks as a home health aide in the Boston area and had no idea that her husband was involved in terrorism.

“Our daughter has lost her husband today, the father of her child,” DeLuca said in a statement released on the day that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed and Dzhokar Tsarnaev was found hiding in a boat in Watertown following a dramatic pursuit during which the brothers traded gunfire with police in multiple Massachusetts communities.

“We cannot begin to comprehend how this horrible tragedy occurred. In the aftermath of the Patriots’ Day horror, we know that we never really knew Tamerlane Tsarnaev,” DeLuca said. “Our hearts are sickened by the knowledge of the horror he has inflicted. Please respect our family’s privacy in this difficult time.”

Three people died, including an eight-year-old boy. More than 260 were injured.