Three more arrested in Boston bombing for aiding jihadis after bombing occurred

I’m just getting caught up now that TRS is back up and running, and here’s the latest breaking news from today:

CBS BOSTON – Three additional suspects were arrested Wednesday in the Boston Marathon bombings investigation.

All three were friends of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and attended UMass-Dartmouth with him. The charges are related to incidents after the bombings and interfering with investigators.

Azamat Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev, 19, both of New Bedford, are charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice by conspiring to destroy, conceal and cover up tangible objects, such as a laptop computer and backpack containing fireworks, belonging to Tsarnaev.

A third suspect, Robel Phillipos, 19 of Cambridge, is charged with willfully making materially false statements to federal law enforcement officials during a terrorism investigation.

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After the arrests were announced, Boston Police said there is no threat to the public. The three are expected in federal court in South Boston Wednesday afternoon.

Azamat Tazhayakov and Dias Kadyrbayev are originally from Kazakhstan.

They entered the United States on student visas. Kadyrbayev and Tazhayakov face maximum sentences of five years in prison and $250,000 each in fines.

Phillipos faces a maximum sentence of eight years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Investigators say Tazhayakov and Kadyrbayev removed items from Tsarnaev’s dormintory room.

According to the complaint unsealed Wednesday afternoon, Tazhayakov and Kadyrbayev admitted to investigators they agreed to get rid of Tsarnaev’s backback “after concluding from news reports that ts was one of the Boston Marathon bombers.”

When the FBI released the first photos of the bombing suspects at 5 p.m. on April 18, Kadyrbayev allegedly “texted Tsarnaev and told him that he looked like the suspect on television.”

Tsarnaev repsonded with “lol” and other statements Kadyrbayev interpreted as jokes.

About an hour later, Tazhayakov, Kadyrbayev, and Phillipos went to Tsarnaev’s dorm room. His roommate let them in and told them Tsarnaev had left a couple of hours earlier. They stayed and watched a movie. It was during this time, according to the complaint, they saw a back pack containing fireworks.

“The fireworks had been opened and emptied of powder. Kadyrbayev knew when he saw the empty fireworks that Tsarnaev was involved in the Marathon bombing,” the complaint stated.

Earlier today, lawyers for Tazhayakov and Kadyrbayev said their clients have been extensively interviewed by federal investigators.

The two men appeared via video for a visa violation hearing in immigration court in Boston on Wednesday.

They have been held in a county jail for more than a week on allegations that they violated their student visas while attending UMass-Dartmouth with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

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