Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s Friend Gets Indicted

A Federal Grand Jury indicted Robel Phillipos, 19, a friend of alleged Marathon bomber Dzokhar Tsarnaev, for lying to the officials who were investigating the bombing.

Phillipos, an American citizen from Cambridge, was originally charged in May along with two other friends of Tsarnaev’s, Dias Kadyrbayev and Azamat Tazhayakov, both Kazakh nationals. When those two were indicted, the AP reported that Phillipos’s lawyers were trying to resolve the case. The indictment suggests that it’s moving forward despite that.

Officials have claimed that the three men went to Tsarnaev’s dorm room at UMass Dartmouth and removed a backpack and fireworks emptied of powder after a photo of their friend was released, identifying him as a bombing suspect. Once Tsarnaev was named, Kadyrbayev and Tazhayakov allegedly threw out the incriminating evidence. Phillipos was accused of concealing that from investigators.

According to a press release from the U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, Phillpos could face up to eight years in federal prison on each of the two counts with which he’s charged. The full text of the original May complaint can be read here, courtesy of WBUR: 

Phillipos Complaint by mmemmott