The alleged perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing earlier this week attended college at Bunker Hill Community College and the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.
Chechen brothers Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, are believed to have emigrated to the United States in 2000 or 2001, according to an interview with their uncle.
The younger brother, Dzhokhar, attended high school at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, a racially-diverse public school in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His former classmates described him as quiet, normal, and nice.
“He was really nice,” said Sam Greenberg, who played soccer with Tsarnaev, in an interview with Slate. “He was pretty quiet. Didn’t have a ton to say but was very normal, seemed like a nice kid.”
Greenberg said that he had many friends, but wasn’t particularly close with anyone.
Larry Aaronson, one of Tsarnaev’s teachers at CRLS, had positive memories of him.
“If someone were to ask me what the kid was like, I would say he had a heart of gold,” said Aaaron in an interview with the Boston Globe. “He was as gracious as possible.”
He was also a member of the wrestling team. His wrestling coach, Peter Payack, described him fondly.
“He seemed like one of the most well-adjusted kids on the team,” said Payack in an interview. “He seemed like he didn’t have any problems. He did his work, came out and became a captain.”
After graduating from CRLS, Dzhokhar attended college at UMass Dartmouth. Pamala Rolon, a senior at the university who socialized with Dzhokhar, said he studied marine biology.
When she saw his picture on the news, her friends joked that it looked like someone they knew.
“We made a joke like — that could be Dzhokhar,” she said in an interview. “But then we thought it just couldn’t be him. Dzhokhar ? Never.”
She also described him as Muslim, but not very religious. He dressed like a normal teen and fit in well.
Dzhokhar’s brother, Tamerlan, took classes at Bunker Hill Community College in fall 2006, spring 2007, and fall 2008, according to The Huffington Post. He studied accounting.
Tamerlan was killed last night in a shootout with police. A manhunt for Dzhokhar is currently underway.
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