Crime & Safety

Bombing Suspect Used to Frequent the Watertown Neighborhood Where He Battled Police, Died

Tamerlan Tsarnaev used to visit East Watertown often to hang out with a friend who lives blocks from the spot where the bombing suspect got into a shootout with police.

The East Watertown neighborhood where Tamerlan Tsarnaev battled police - and where he died - was familiar ground for the Boston Marathon Bombing suspect.

For a time, Tsarnaev visited the neighborhood on almost a daily basis to dance to hiphop music, smoke marijuana and pray at the house of a friend on Boylston Street, just blocks from where the bombing suspect was killed, according to a report in the Boston Globe.

Watertown resident Sebastian A. Freddura knew Tsarnaev from Cambridge, and remembered him as a freewheeling Muslim who carried around a prayer rug in his car.

Find out what's happening in Watertownfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

“He’d wash his hands and lay it out in the backyard and pray for 20 minutes or a half-hour a handful of times a day,” Freddura told the Globe. “We’d smoke a jay and he’d come out and pray.”

Tsarnaev's visits largely ended after he met his wife, Katherine O. Russell, in 2010, the Globe reported.

Find out what's happening in Watertownfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

Freddura, who goes by the stage name SebNyce or Mr. Nyce, did not see the security camera images from the scene of the Boston Bombings until after the mayhem that engulfed his East End neighborhood. When he saw the pictures, he immediately recognized Tsarnaev.

“There wasn’t really a doubt in my mind in terms of recognizing him," he told the Globe.

Back in his home on Boylston Street on the hours after the shootout, Freddura feared that Tsarnaev's brother Dzhokhar - who survived the shooutout - might come knocking on his door. He grabbed a hammer just in case Dzhokhar showed up at his home, according to the Globe.

Watertown's East End is not the only area that Tsarnaev used to visit. He reportedly worked at a pizza place in Brighton and had a friend in Waltham. Three people were killed in the Waltham home, and authorities are now investigating whether Tamerlan Tsarnaev played a role in those homicides.

Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.