Tsarnaev sues supermax
Claims loss of his hat and bandana, 3 showers a week causing anxiety
A judge said the ‘filing is deficient’ because it does not include a ‘certified copy of prisoner’s trust fund statement’ and a $402 filing fee.
Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is suing the federal government for $250,000 over what he says in a hand-written lawsuit is “disturbing” and “unprofessional” treatment inside the supermax prison in Colorado.
Tsarnaev, now 26, accuses guards and the warden at the Federal Correctional Complex Florence — called the “Alcatraz of the Rockies” — of being “unlawful, unreasonable and discriminatory.”
He specifically cites the confiscation of his white baseball cap and bandana that he purchased at the prison commissary and not being able to take more showers. He adds the harsh treatment has made his life inside the prison’s H-Unit so anxious it is adding to his “mental and physical decline.”
The lawsuit was filed Monday and assigned to a federal judge, according to court records. But the judge stated Tuesday the “filing is deficient” because it does not include a “certified copy of prisoner’s trust fund statement” and a $402 filing fee.
Tsarnaev alleges his baseball cap and bandana were confiscated by prison guards “because, by wearing it, I was ‘ disrespecting’ the FBI and the victims” of the April 15, 2013, Boston Marathon bombing.
“There is no proof and no evidence to support (the) false accusation,” Tsarnaev alleges in his eight-page lawsuit posted on the federal court system.
It is not explained why his cap may have offended anyone, but before the world knew Tsarnaev’s name, he was referred to by investigators as the prime suspect in a “White Hat” worn backward seen leaving the scene of the Boylston Street bombings. That same hat — a Polo cap — was used as evidence in his death penalty sentencing.
Tsarnaev’s death sentence was thrown out last fall over concerns with the jury selection process. Federal prosecutors are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case, calling it “one of the most important terrorism prosecutions in our nation’s history.”
If the nation’s highest court does not rule, prosecutors can leave Tsarnaev locked up for life without parole or seek a new death penalty trial.
Tsarnaev, a student at UMass Dartmouth at the time of the bombing, and his older brother, Tamerlan, set off the two bombs at the marathon finish line, killing three people and wounding more than 260 others. His older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was killed in a manhunt three days later — run over by his brother fleeing in a car.
The bombing killed Martin Richard, 8; Krystle Campbell, 29; and Lu Lingzi, 23. More than 260 people were injured. MIT Police Officer Sean Collier, 27, was shot execution-style days later by the Tsarnaevs.
Boston Police Officer Dennis Simmonds, 28, injured in the Watertown shootout in which Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed, died in April 2014.
Former Florence prison warden Bob Hood told the Herald on Wednesday that Tsarnaev’s lawsuit is common among inmates.
“I get it. He wants more than three showers a week,” Hood said. “But he’s twentysomething living in a 7-foot box where life is worse than if he did get the death penalty.”