ARAb StAtES diSMAyEd At WESt'S cOMPlAcENcy - Kuwait Times

SATURDAY, MAY 4, 2013
Garrett Plath (right) holds a sign and Toni Zagami
(left) wears a “Boston Strong” shirt as they stand
outside the Dyer-Lake Funeral Home in North
Attleborough, Massachusetts, where a vehicle
believed to be carrying the body of Boston
Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev
arrived Thursday.—AP
Boston suspect’s
mortuary offers
Muslim services
BOSTON: Funeral arrangements for the Boston Marathon
bombing suspect killed in a shootout with police are
being handled by a funeral home that has experience with
Muslim services.
Peter Stefan, owner of Graham Putnam and Mahoney
Funeral Parlors in Worcester confirmed yesterday he is
handling funeral arrangements for Tamerlan Tsarnaev but
he could not confirm whether he has possession of the
body. Stefan says everybody deserves a dignified burial
service no matter the circumstances of their death and he
is prepared for protests. He says arrangements have yet to
be worked out.
Several protesters showed up outside a North
Attleborough funeral home Thursday night where
Tsarnaev’s body was taken following its release by the
state medical examiner. Timothy Nay of the Dyer-Lake
Funeral Home says he is no longer in possession of the
body.—AP
Anti-gun groups focus
on Pryor with ads, visit
LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas: As one of five Democrats who opposed
expanding background checks for firearm sales, US Sen. Mark
Pryor of Arkansas is facing pressure from gun control groups who
are urging him to rethink a position they suggest could haunt
him during his re-election bid next year.
Mayors Against Illegal Guns on Thursday brought the father of
a student killed in the Newtown, Connecticut school shooting
last year to Arkansas in the hopes of arranging a meeting with
the two term senator. The director of the group also said it plans
to soon air radio ads and mail direct mail pieces directed focused
on Pryor.
Pryor is among several lawmakers the group, co-founded by
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, is focusing on for opposing
the background checks measure that failed in the Senate last
month. Pryor and Sen. Mark Begich of Alaska are the only
Democrats who opposed the measure who are seeking re-election
next year.
“This can easily become a dry policy issue where senators get
their facts from the same place they get their campaign money.
The way you change that is you sit them down with people who
lost their children and didn’t have to,” Mark Glaze, executive
director of the group, said. “It is the only thing that works in the
end, in our experience.”
Glaze said the group also planned to soon launch radio ads
and a direct mail effort in Arkansas, with a focus on African-
American voters - who tend to favor stronger background check
measures - but said the group’s immediate focus as on getting
Pryor to reconsider his position on background checks.
“It is hard for me to imagine a combination of constituencies
that would get Mark Pryor over the finish line if he doesn’t perform
exceptionally well in the African American community,”
Glaze said.—AP
HOUSTON: A man who had fired a gun
inside a ticketing area at Houston’s largest
airport was killed after being confronted by
a law enforcement official during an incident
that sent people in the terminal
scrambling and screaming, police said on
Thursday.
It’s unclear if the man fatally shot himself
or was killed by a Homeland Security
agent who had confronted him, said
Houston police spokesman Kese Smith.
The man’s name was not released by
police, but they said he was about 30-
years-old.
Police say the man walked into the ticketing
area in Terminal B at Bush
Intercontinental Airport around 1:35 pm
and fired at least one shot into the air. The
agent, who was in his office, came out and
confronted the man, telling him to drop his
weapon, but the man refused, police said.
“The suspect then turned toward the
special agent. The special agent, fearing for
his safety and all the passengers in the terminal,
discharged his weapon at the same
time it appears the suspect may have shot
himself,” Smith said. The man died at the
scene. An autopsy will be conducted.
Police would not say what kind of
weapon the man had. The terminal was
closed immediately after the shooting. But
later Thursday, parts of the terminal were
reopened to passengers. The rest of the airport
remained open after the shooting.
Darian Ward, a spokeswoman for the
Houston Airport System, said some passengers
who were scheduled to leave from
Terminal B were rerouted to other terminals.
Dale Howard, of Tomball, was at the
baggage handling area of the airport waiting
for his sister to arrive on an incoming
flight when he heard two shots fired from
INTERNATIONAL
Man killed after firing
shot at Houston airport
Incident sends people scrambling, screaming
PHOENIX: Jodi Arias’ defense attorneys
were set to present closing arguments in
the murder case that has become a tabloid
and cable TV sensation with its graphic
tales of sex and lies and has attracted
spectators from around the country who
line up as early as 2 am for a chance to
score a few open seats in the courtroom.
Arias, 32, is charged with first-degree murder
in the June 2008 death of her one-time
boyfriend at his suburban Phoenix home.
Authorities say she planned the attack on
Travis Alexander after he wanted to end
their relationship and prepared for a trip
to Mexico with another woman.
Arias initially denied any involvement
then later blamed it on masked intruders.
Two years after her arrest, she said she
killed him in self-defense when he
attacked her after a day of sex. If convicted
of first-degree murder, Arias faces a potential
death sentence or life in prison. Jurors
also have the option of finding her guilty
of second-degree murder, punishable by
up to 25 years in prison, if they don’t
believe she planned the attack but instead
think it occurred in the heat of the
moment. A third option is manslaughter,
which carries a sentence of seven to 21
years.
Arias wept and looked away from
jurors Thursday as prosecutor Juan
Martinez concluded closing arguments by
displaying a gruesome photo of
Alexander’s back, covered in stab wounds,
while describing her as a manipulative liar
who meticulously planned the savage
attack. He pounded his hand on a table,
raising his voice occasionally but largely
speaking in an almost whisper-like tone.
Martinez said Arias lied from the start and
is still lying, and hoped to fool the jury into
believing she is the victim.
“That’s what she wants you to believe,”
Martinez said, the photo of Alexander’s
dead body displayed on a large screen
behind him. “But actually, in reality, it’s
this,” he said, motioning toward the
autopsy picture. The images displayed
Thursday, one after another, of
Alexander’s decomposed body covered in
stab wounds, of his bruised face with a
gunshot wound above the forehead, of
the bloody scene of the killing, were too
much for Alexander’s friends and family
members. They sobbed and buried their
faces in their hands.
“This is an individual who will stop at
nothing, and who will continue to be
manipulative and will lie at every turn,”
Martinez told jurors. Alexander suffered
nearly 30 knife wounds, was shot in the
head, and had his throat slit. Arias’ palm
print was found in blood at the scene,
along with nude photos of her and the victim
from the day of the killing.
Arias said Alexander grew physically
abusive in the months before she killed
him, but there was no evidence or testimony
during the trial to corroborate her
allegations.
The defense has portrayed Alexander
as a cheating womanizer who used Arias
for sex and abused her physically and
the floor above. A few seconds later, he
said he heard three more shots.
“People were screaming. I knew exactly
what it was - gunfire,” Howard said. Police
from an adjacent station rushed in, and
Howard said he directed them to the floor
above.
Greg Newburn, who was in the terminal
waiting for a flight to Oklahoma City, said
he was sitting in a cafe area when he heard
two gunshots and after a pause, several
more. “It seemed like quite a few shots.
Everyone was scrambling, running left and
running right, turning tables up and hiding
behind tables. Nobody knew what was
happening. I couldn’t tell where the shots
were coming from,” he said.
Newburn, from Gainesville, Flordia, said
it took him a few seconds to realize that
the shots had come from the ticketing
area, near the security checkpoint. —AP
Defense set for closing
arguments in Arias trial
emotionally. Prosecutors depicted Arias as
an obsessed ex-girlfriend who couldn’t
come to grips with the ending relationship.
Martinez told jurors that Arias had
been stalking Alexander and arrived unannounced
on the day she killed him, sneaking
into his home at about 4 a.m. The two
went to sleep together, then awoke and
had sex.
At some point, Martinez said, Arias
decided it was time to carry out her murderous
plan. Martinez displayed text messages
that Alexander and Arias exchanged
about a week before the killing. “I want
you to understand how evil I think you
are,” Alexander wrote to her.
The key to a first-degree murder conviction
lies with intent, and Martinez said
repeatedly that Arias planned the killing
well in advance. Arias’ grandparents had
reported a .25 caliber handgun stolen
from their Northern California home about
a week before Alexander’s death - the
same caliber used to shoot him. — AP
PHOENIX: Defendant Jodi Arias listens to prosecutor Juan Martinez makes
his closing arguments during her trial at Maricopa County Superior Court
in Phoenix on Thursday.—AP