The Marathon Bomber is Suing the Jail for $250K After They Took His Baseball Hat and Limited His Showers
Source - Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has sued the federal government for $250,000 over his treatment at the Colorado prison where he is serving a life sentence.
Tsarnaev, 26, calls his treatment in the handwritten suit filed Monday “unlawful, unreasonable and discriminatory.” He cites the confiscation of a white baseball cap and bandana that he bought at the prison commissary and a limit of three showers per week, the Boston Herald reported.
His treatment at the supermax Federal Correctional Complex Florence is contributing to his “mental and physical decline,” he says in the lawsuit. ...
Tsarnaev alleges his 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, bombing.
During the investigation, Tsarnaev was referred to by law enforcement as “White Hat” when he was seen on surveillance video leaving the scene of the bombings.
That would be this "White Hat":
"Black Hat" was how the investigators referred to Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's brother Tamerlan. But he's the one referred to by Massholes only by his other name, Speedbump. Because this is what Dzhokar did to him when he tried to flee the scene at the shootout in Watertown:
That said, what right to prison officials have to take away Dzhokhar's hat? I mean, it's a free country, right? OK, not for convicted terrorists responsible for the deaths of three people at the Marathon, one MIT campus police officer and a Boston police officer at the shootout (who died of complications in 2014) per se. But still. Where do they get off treating him like he's in jail? OK, he is in jail. But that doesn't make it right.
Just because Dzhokhar hated America so much he placed bombs behind the feet of children, injured 264 people and requiring amputations to 16 people (three lost more than one limb) doesn't mean he's not entitled to the basic American right to wear whatever he wants, does it? If he wants to wear a white ballcap like he had on that day, or a backpack like the one he carried the bomb in or his lucky bombing outfit or a shirt that says "I MURDERED AND MAIMED INNOCENTS AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT" well then he should be free to do so. The liberty to freely express yourself in prison is part of everyone's basic right as a child killer or else I'm reading the Constitution all wrong.
If it makes Dzhokhar happy to rock his signature white snapback lid - or a tuxedo or a Vegas showgirl ensemble with a huge hat and feather boa - who are we to deny him? And if we as a society choose to take that pleasure away, the least we can do is pay him what he wants. A quarter of a million dollars is a small price when we've infringed on his self-expression like this.
So I say we pay the man his money. Then give him his hat back. And even though most of the developed world would kill to get three showers a week, let's give him unlimited shower privileges. And while we're at it, give him his freedom back. Announce that he's being released on Boylston Street at a particular time and place. Then the people of Boston will be able to recognize him by the hat. Only this time, they'll know not to ignore him.