Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Spoke to the Public for the First Time Since the Boston Bombing Today

Boston Bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev returned to court today for the first time since a federal grand jury sentenced him to die on May 15. His sentencing hearing brought victims and their families face-to-face with the infamous terrorist, offering them a chance for catharsis—and the usually stoic Tsarnaev broke down into tears and expressed regret for his crime.

"I would like to apologize to the victims and survivors," he said, later adding, "I am Muslim. My religion is Islam. I pray to Allah, to bestow his mercy on those affected in the bombing and their families. I pray for your healing."

There was never any doubt about the defendant's guilt. When the trial first began in March, Tsarnaev's attorney blatantly said, "It was him." The defense team spent the rest of the trial trying to convince the jury that their client was under the influence of his radicalized older brother, Tamerlan, when he placed a pressure cooker near the finish line of the 2013 marathon, killing three and injuring 260.

Until Wednesday, Tsarnaev has never spoken in public after the bombing, except to plead "not guilty." Rather than take the stand to beg for forgiveness during the penalty phase of the trial, the defendant and his legal team relied on a famous nun who met with him in prison and testified that he was "truly sorry." His silence left jurors trying to peer inside his mind with little new material to focus on besides the security camera still of Tsarnaev flicking off a camera in custody.

Ultimately, a jury didn't believe that he was coerced, or that he was remorseful, according to a complicated checklist they filled out to determine their verdict.

But on Wednesday, Tsarnaev, who has nothing to lose at this point, finally spoke up. "Immediately after the bombing, of which I am guilty of, there is little doubt about that, I learned their faces, their names," he reportedly said while crying.

Before Tsarnaev said his piece, family members of the victims got to express their anger and frustration while standing only about 20 feet away from the young man who caused them so much grief.

"What you did to my daughter was disgusting," Patricia Campbell, whose daughter died in the blast, told the 21-year-old. "I don't know what to say to you. I think they jury did the right thing."

Today was also the last anyone will see of Tsarnaev before he's locked up at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, to await a death that is probably years away (a lengthy appeals process is likely). The judge was the one who officially handed down the decree, but judges are required by law to follow the sentencing advice of juries in death penalty cases like this one, according to the Washington Post.

"I sentence you to the penalty of death by execution," District Judge George A. O'Toole Jr said, before piling on: "No one will remember that your teachers were fond of you, that you were funny, a good athlete. Whenever your name is mentioned, what will be remembered is the evil you have done."

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