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One Boston Marathon Bomb Suspect Dead, Other At Large After Shootout With Police

theodp writes "During the night, The Tech broke news that gunshots were reported at MIT near 32 Vassar Street (the Ray and Maria Stata Center for Computer, Information, and Intelligence Sciences), and one officer was shot and taken to Mass General Hospital. MIT's Emergency Information page also reports that injuries have been reported. Sadly, CNN is now reporting that the university police officer has died. Look for updates on Twitter." The two suspects identified earlier as being behind the Boston Marathon bombings are believed to be responsible for this. They were found by police. One suspect, 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was killed in a shootout. The other suspect, 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, is still being pursued. The Associated Press reports that the two are believed to be from the Russian region near Chechnya. During the firefight, the suspects threw explosive devices at police. Public transit in Boston has been shut down, and hundreds of thousands of people have been asked to not leave their homes. Here are live feed for local TV news and emergency services audio. Police have been warned that the remaining suspect may have a suicide vest.

Reader Okian Warrior points out a related story worthy of notice: "The 4chan crowd, poring over images of the Boston marathon, identified two dark-skinned and bag-carrying suspects (among others). This was then picked up by The New York Post, who ran the image on Thursday's front page with the headline 'Feds seek these two pictured at Boston Marathon.' And now, a completely innocent teen now finds himself scared to leave his home."

32 of 1,109 comments (clear)

  1. MIT by symes · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It looks like, from what I can gather from online media etc., that they were carrying explosives to plant around MIT. And it was campus security that first become suspicious. If this is the case, then thoughts are with the campus security officer that gave his life - a lot of students are probably a lot better off because of his bravery. Thoughts are with everyone in boston and hope this is over soon.

    1. Re:MIT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If this is the case, then thoughts are with the campus security officer that gave his life
       
      Why aren't your thoughts with him anyway? Even if he was just pulling the guys over for driving too fast on campus the bottom line is still the same; he's a guy who's dead for just doing his job.
       
      There are tons of crappy cops, yes. The ratio of crappy versus good cops seems to go up when you're dealing with rent-a-cops and security, yes. But the bulk of people enforcing the law are just looking to do the right thing, go home alive and enjoy life just as much as you and me. I believe it's a profession that gets a bad rap because there are plenty of abusive asses who are drawn to a job with the prospect of beating people down but I think there are many more who are drawn to the profession because they have an honest interest in serving and protecting.
       
      Sorry if you didn't mean it that way but there are just so many people around here who are willing to look down on a cop just because he is a cop. No different a form of bigotry than any other.

    2. Re:MIT by drinkypoo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There are tons of crappy cops, yes. The ratio of crappy versus good cops seems to go up when you're dealing with rent-a-cops and security, yes. But the bulk of people enforcing the law are just looking to do the right thing, go home alive and enjoy life just as much as you and me.

      [citation needed]

      People believe cops are bad because cops do so many bad things. They have not taken responsibility as a group and purged their ranks of bad cops, so people will continue to assume that every cop is a bad cop. This is the only rational assumption to make, because many of them are bad people, and they have power over you. Thus, you must be on your guard against bad cops, and you must assume that any cop interaction will go wrong.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    3. Re:MIT by P-niiice · · Score: 5, Interesting

      In other words, many are good cops despite being cops.

    4. Re:MIT by sribe · · Score: 5, Informative

      The ratio of crappy versus good cops seems to go up when you're dealing with rent-a-cops and security, yes.

      OK, just stop this bullshit now.

      MIT Campus Police are real police, recruited only from among real police departments, with lots of experience required before they can even apply to the department.

    5. Re:MIT by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I believe it's a profession that gets a bad rap because there are plenty of abusive asses who are drawn to a job with the prospect of beating people down but I think there are many more who are drawn to the profession because they have an honest interest in serving and protecting.

      When the video footage of the Marathon Bombing started to be played, I pointed out to my wife that the it was a perfect example of the difference between the "average cop" and many people's perception of the average cop - the cops were the ones running TOWARD the explosions while everyone else ran AWAY.

      Just something to keep in mind....

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
  2. Gotta Love 4chan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Reader Okian Warrior points out a related story worthy of notice:
    "The 4chan crowd, poring over images of the Boston marathon, identified two dark-skinned and bag-carrying suspects (among others). This was then picked up by The New York Post, who ran the image on Thursday's front page with the headline 'Feds seek these two pictured at Boston Marathon.' And now, a completely innocent teen now finds himself scared to leave his home."

    Dark skinned. He must be guilty. Basically 4chan, like anonymous, is simply a bastion of the socially immature taking vigilante justice into their own hands. Stoke the fire of society's fears and then claim innocence when someone acts on their "information".

    1. Re:Gotta Love 4chan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Let's see: these guys went to MIT.
      MIT has Fraternities
      There were Fraternaties in the movie Animal House, in which Kevin Bacon had a role.
      Kevin Bacon's last name is the same as a popular pork based breakfast food.
      Pork is an unclean animal and not allowed in Islamic culture.
      Al Qauida is an Islamic terror group.

      => these guys are linked to Al Qauida (let lose the drones of war)

  3. Re:infowars.com by anjrober · · Score: 5, Interesting

    there are military at nearly every marathon with backpacks.
    especially the big ones
    they hike the course alongside the runners.
    i've run 8 marathons (including this years boston marathon) and at 6 of them there were various military hikers. they are always very supportive of the runners and vice versa
    this has nothing to do with the bombings.

  4. And Now the Crowd-sourcing Cleanup Phase by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "The 4chan crowd, poring over images of the Boston marathon, identified two dark-skinned and bag-carrying suspects (among others). This was then picked up by The New York Post, who ran the image on Thursday's front page with the headline 'Feds seek these two pictured at Boston Marathon.' And now, a completely innocent teen now finds himself scared to leave his home."

    Yesterday on my facebook news feed I saw no less than three fake images that could have been mean pranks. And I didn't even see the one listed above. So now all the "crowd sourced" news folks are going to remove images of this man and this woman and this guy. The reason I didn't propagate these things was that they could have been anybody! You could play a mean prank on a friend/enemy if you have a picture of him with a backpack.

    Also there are many fake first hand accounts but also some real first hand accounts in crowdsourced news. Ignore the former and herald the latter. People will think you're doing god's work simply because they didn't watch the shitfest that is crowdsourced news in the moments of pure confusion immediately following the event. The signal to noise ratio, the added noise, the fact that people can start leads anonymously, it all reeks of a really bad, lawless, unaccountable lynch mob.

    So now post hoc you scrub out all those false leads and you clean up all the things you were wrong about. Then when that's done you point out the few leads you were right about. Then you go on and on at length about how 4chan and reddit are the new real sources of journalism. The mainstream press is busted to all hell (do not confuse this with a free pass or defense for them) but they know they'll be held accountable and the New York Post's gamble should really turn into a slander/libel suit with damages paid out to that young man. NYP made money off those 'exclusive' images at the expense of a person's safety and that should be a civil suit that should expose the NYP for what it really is: a piece of shit rag no better than a tabloid version of "crowd-sourced" news.

    Who was it that initially fingered Salah Eddin Barhoum? You don't know and no one ever will because there is no integrity with how that lead was developed.

    --
    My work here is dung.
    1. Re:And Now the Crowd-sourcing Cleanup Phase by girlintraining · · Score: 5, Insightful

      , the fact that people can start leads anonymously, it all reeks of a really bad, lawless, unaccountable lynch mob.

      Yes, but if you point that out, everyone jumps on you to shut you up. Asking even educated and highly literate people to restrain themselves is an excercise in futility. They will have their emotional satisfaction, dammit, and who cares who gets hurt? Yet these very same people rant about the ineptitude of government and the restriction of their civil liberties.

      Well guys, take a good look: The government found the right people, in a targeted search, within days. The general public, would, and have, condemned a half dozen innocent people to spent the rest of their lives in fear. Very few will feel any remorse whatsoever for reposting these "crowdsourced" reports. The officers who investigated this, on the other hand, risked and gave their lives in pursuit of the actual criminals... and nobody else. If this is any indication, the government is far better at keeping you safe and preserving your freedoms than the general public is. And the government, at least, apologizes when they screw up -- usually with big piles of cash to the victims.

      The vigilants can't say the same. Their only apology is that they're already looking for the next innocent to hang.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
  5. Re:One Suspect Dead by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    A brilliant plan with only two drawbacks. One, they didn't have any anaesthetic bullets. Two, there isn't such a thing as anaesthetic bullets.

  6. vk.com site + New York Times Article review by girlinatrainingbra · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Website of Djohar Tsarnaev at vk.com

    The New York Times is reporting that the two suspects attempted to light a bomb while engaging in gun-fire with the police during a standoff outside of the Watertown, MA, house of Andrew Kitzenberg. Andy Kitzenberg has been live tweeting images of the police activity, shootout, and bomb explosions, and a bullet going through his wall and his armchair on twitter as linked above.

    One of the brothers went to Cambridge Rindge and Latin, one of the oldest high schools in the USA.

  7. Re:News for nerds? by Bill_the_Engineer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The nerdy part being that social media and the large number of photos taken by people in the crowd from their smartphones were used in the quick investigation which lead to the alleged bombers.

    --
    These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
  8. Re:infowars.com by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    clearly you don't know how conspiracy theories work.

    the fact that they weren't wearing illuminati sigils proves that it was the stone masons pretending to be illuminati to hide the fact that there were martians disguised as humans running in the marathon.

  9. Terrorist or freedom fighter? by roman_mir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So what do you call them now, Americans, are these Chechen guys "terrorists" or "freedom fighters"?

    They are Islamist, that much certain, so why are they bombing USA, after all USA was probably more on the side of Chechens in their search for independence from Russia (this is of-course about oil, there is oil in Chechnya).

    However it is my personal guess that these guys wanted to bring some terror to USA as an asymmetric response to USA being in the Middle East, Afghanistan most likely. What is interesting is that the two brothers (Johar is the younger one) lived in USA as refugees since 2000-2001. What else could be their motivation if not a newly discovered sympathy towards their 'brothers in religion' somewhere in the Afghan mountains, being attacked by the US empire?

    I think this is an example of how exactly the war on Terror will backfire just like the war on drugs did with more violence and more drugs.

    War on terror creates more terrorists that were just kids just a few years ago. War on drugs creates more drug related violence.

    There is an old idea that violence begets violence, I think it's very much true.

  10. Perhaps the best argument for gun control by Overzeetop · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I know...mod me down as an anti-gun nut. But at least try to make the connection.

    The advantage of crowdsourcing is that you get a shit-ton of information quickly, and it gets disseminated just as quickly. Everybody with a cell phone and a social media account has had this stuff in front of them since the bombing. It's great because it happens so fast, and millions of people being on alert can make for a quicker break in the case. It also has the downside of putting up a lot of false positives.

    The NRA's stance is that if everyone had a gun, criminals would know not to so bad stuff and if they did there would be someone right there to stop them. It's basically crowd sourcing police/law enforcement work. Yes, there are now lots more people who can intervene with a criminal who is armed and dangerous. Just as everyone with a cell phone can photograph a scene and post the pictures on line for the world to peruse and instantly identify criminals.

    Thing is, the more people who are involved, the higher the likelihood of a false positive. In the case of photos and social media, the mis-identified have a reason to be concerned short term, but once the media self-corrects and the correct criminals are identified their lives will slowly get back to normal. When guns are involved, a mis-identified person or bystander doesn't get a new life when the actual criminal is killed. The "oops" is permanent.

    If you don't think there isn't the equivalent of 4chan in the vigilante world, you're sorely mistaken. It's part of the human condition to jump to conclusions based on limited evidence and not everyone will have the forethought or presence of mind not to take out someone who they think is about to cause harm to others.

    If we used the NRA method of justice, Salah Eddin Barhoum would have been dead before the FBI even published the photos of the actual bombers.

    (nb: I am a gun owner)

    --
    Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
  11. "From the Russian region near Chechnya"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    He's not from _near_ Chechnya. It's not a city, it's a region. They are Chechens. References to "his native Chechnya". (The capital is Grozny).

    He doesn't consider himself Russian, and he doesn't think he comes from "the Russian region near Chechnya". It was a de facto republic that Russia regained control of militarily.

    He's likely a Sunni muslim, but it's quite possible that isn't really a factor here; this could simply be an international protest bombing regarding the west's stance on Chechen independence. Chechens are Muslims the way that Russians are Orthodox Christians and Americans are Catholic or Calvinist in origin; Islam hasn't as far as I understand it been a feature element of their struggle.

  12. Re:One Suspect Dead by 1s44c · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The first reports of any incident are always wildly inaccurate yet people are very fast to jump to judgement because of them.

    I remember when the brave UK police only just caught a dangerous terrorist who was running though the London metro system with the clear intention of detonating a backpack bomb in there. Two weeks later the story was the about an innocent man on his way to work who was held down and shot 7 times in the head by the police without even being given a warning. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Charles_de_Menezes

    My point is wait two weeks because the current version of who did what and why could well turn out to be wrong.

  13. Re:Will Box for Passport by MerceanCoconut · · Score: 5, Interesting
    One of the photo captions reads:

    Tamerlan says: "I don't have a single American friend, I don't understand them."

  14. Sexist!!!!!!!!!! by cayenne8 · · Score: 5, Funny

    erroneous reports of dark-skinned males, light-skinned males

    Why is it always MALES??

    I mean, why can't we get more WOMEN into terrorism? We can't seem to get them interested in Engineering, and now it seems we need more equal opportunity for terrorism.

    What can be done about this? Sheesh, will the sexism never end for us??

    --
    Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    1. Re:Sexist!!!!!!!!!! by dkleinsc · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Why is it always MALES??

      I know you're being silly, but the real reason is that the vast majority of the world's cultures (much of the US included) see violence as something that women do only when protecting their kids.

      This has lots of other implications, such as the significant number of people who believe that men can't be raped by women or be victims of domestic violence.

      --
      I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  15. Re:News for nerds? by DerekLyons · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The other nerdy part, the elephant in the room everyone is dancing around, is how the much vaunted "crowdsourced" media got it wrong - badly so. That part will go down the memory hole as people confuse "the authorities going through the photos from the crowds" with "the crowds going through the photos".

  16. Re:bruce schneier was right. by squiggleslash · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, it's a temporary thing, based on the desire to apprehend two people considered extremely dangerous. If these people were Newtown style shooters - killing people out of mental instability rather than an ideological goal (and who knows, it's improbably but that might still be the case) and their exact whereabouts were unknown, I'd expect a similar reaction.

    Terror? No, you're giving in to it if, after these guys are dealt with, you institute permanent or pseudo-temporary security restrictions that affect everyone, or if you wildly attack foreign countries simply because they have tenuous links to a terrorist attack, and if you, yourself, refuse to board a plane or run in a marathon or take a job in a high building or panic upon hearing about a Islamic outreach center promoting peace being built half a mile away from the site of an Islamic terrorist attack, or refuse to step in a British pub, or British bus, or British train station, or...

    This isn't a case where fear is being used to shut down Boston, it's a case where a law enforcement process is temporarily having that affect. It's not permanent, it's not something unique to terrorism enforcement (in fact, it's refreshing seeing an act of terror be treated as the jurisdiction of law enforcement), and it's probably what has to be done right now.

    --
    You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  17. Re:One Suspect Dead by the_raptor · · Score: 5, Informative

    That is really a movie thing, in real life giving the patient enough morphine to shut them up is also a good way to kill them. In WWII medics were very careful about morphine use (eg pinning used syrettes to the soldiers collar so field hospitals would know morphine had been administered).

    --

    ========
    CINC, 4th Penguin Legion
  18. Re:One Suspect Dead by Barefoot+Monkey · · Score: 5, Funny

    "You fool! I asked for general anesthetic bullets, not local. Now they're unstoppable!

  19. Re:Watch the total absence by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The IRA were nasty. They wanted to cause alarm and panic, and they didn't mind too much if bystanders got hurt. But unlike the Muslims they did issue warnings. The killing and maiming was a not the primary aim, the panic and disruption was.

    Look at the IRA's death toll. Apparently, they were whispering those "warnings" up the Bishop's ass.

    There's not that much difference between the IRA and Al Qaeda. Both self-righteous religious murderers.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  20. Re:Watch the total absence by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes, unfortunately that list also for some unknown reason (well I lie, it's not known, that list has been produced by someone with a bias) completely missing many other incidents.

    There were in the same period attacks that would also fall under the lose definition used (or even a much tighter definition) of terrorist attacks by Shining Path rebels in Peru, Farc rebels in Colombia, Buddhists in Burma (against muslims), PIRA in Ireland, Hindus in India (against muslims). I could probably go on if I bother to Google for other parts of the world that the Western press rarely gives a fuck about but there's little point given that there's enough here to run a bulldozer over the worthfulness of that list.

    Further, it seems a little odd to take a list so many attacks in Afghanistan and Iraq and pretend they're somehow evidence of muslims being somehow a problematic grouping of people without considering the context of those attacks and that they were triggered by the actions of Bush and Blair's modern Christian crusades and that most attacks are against other muslims so are as much demonstrative of civil war, than terrorism.

    But anyway, I don't know why I'm bothering, you've made enough posts in response to enough stories that have absolutely no relevance to Islam proclaiming your hate for it for it to be obvious you are a fully signed up far right propagandist and hence inherently unable to think rationally or converse sensibly on this topic, but I guess for the benefit of others, perhaps they can at least see that terrorism happens globally, and that muslims are as much victims as they are perpetrators. You only have to look at the suffering muslims faced in Afghanistan in the 80s by the USSR, and Chechnya as a result of Putin's policies for example to see that they haven't exactly had an easy ride themselves. You may think a few attacks in the West are evidence of some horrible group of people far worse than anyone else, but here's an idea - why not go live somewhere like Burma, or Islamic areas of India for a while and then tell me they're the bad guys not the victims - you don't know what terrorism is unless you've seen or bothered to even read about how some of these communities suffer daily.

  21. Re:Watch the total absence by squiggleslash · · Score: 5, Informative

    The IRA put bombs in pubs and Burger Kings, with nothing resembling a "warning" issued and with there being little point in planting them unless the aim was to kill civilians, primarily or secondarily.

    Frankly I'm tried of hearing people on this side of the Atlantic give them a pass simply because they were made up predominantly of Christians and because their cause is sympathetic. They were (and the remaining pockets who've continued to fight since the peace agreements of the 1990s still are) murderous thugs. At best, you can argue they weren't as lethal, with fewer people killed and with no attempt to drag in unrelated countries into their bitter dispute. But yes, as a Brit living in Britain for the first 25 years of my life, there was a target on my back - not as big as it was for soldiers, police, and everyone from construction workers to bankers considered by some arbitrary definition to be helping the British in Northern Ireland, but it was there.

    --
    You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  22. Re:Will Box for Passport by kilfarsnar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Personally I hope the FSB and CIA start working together on the 'Islam' problem.

    Is that like the Jewish problem? Someone tried to take care of that a while back too.

    --
    "What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
  23. Re:One Suspect Dead by rahvin112 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Russia had a terrorist attack about a decade ago where Terrorists took an entire theater of people hostage. Russians pumped the theater full of Fentanyl gas (Fentanyl is a synthetic opiate, very strong, but colorless, odorless and tasteless). They did this because opiates put you to sleep rather quickly and you are often unaware it's happening.

    To ensure they had enough gas in there to knock out the biggest (body mass) terrorist they basically ended up killing everyone in the theater that was under about 180lbs (more than 100 innocent people). Using opiates as knock out drugs is a good way to kill someone because if you miss dose even a little bit they stop breathing.

  24. Re: Holy crap! by cyn1c77 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Time to get my Concealed Carry Permit.

    Won't stop a bomb, but would be pretty handy if people like these two chuckle heads decide to start shooting things up instead of blowing them up.

    You should take some basic handgun safety classes followed by some active shooting classes before you consider a CCW permit.

    See if you can handle your shit in a mock active-shooter scenario. Because I guarantee that, in practice, if you can't consistently clear a jammed feed, draw your gun properly, disable the safety, and stay behind cover, then you won't be able to do it properly when you are actually about to kill someone. Plus, it is really hard to hit someone who is shooting back at you, especially if they planned ahead and have body armor, a shotgun, a semi-auto rifle and 200 rounds as compared to your two (legal) low-capacity magazines.

    You may also find that you do not like the responsibility associated with carrying a firearm... Are you going to help others in danger or just yourself? Are you willing to accept the consequences of misinterpreting a rapidly evolving situation and doing the wrong thing? What if you accidentally shoot an undercover cop? What if you shoot a gang-member and the gang comes after you or your family? What if you accidentally shoot another CCW-holding citizen responding to the same situation? What if he shoots you? Is your spouse on-board with you carrying a loaded weapon on your person? Are you willing to no longer be able to drink alcohol on the days that you are carrying?

    Also, remember that in a city, you can't legally take your gun into most stores or offices. If you illegally take it in, you are subject to a felony and loss of your CCW permit. And the average legal fees associated with shooting someone in self-defense are spectacular... upwards of $400K if the family decides to sue you.

    I am not saying that you shouldn't go for it. Just be aware there is a lot of baggage associated with the "right" to carry and it is better to be aware of those issues up front.