Crime stories inundated "the headlines in 2013 like no year in recent history," according to The Huffington Post. "In the past 12 months, we've seen the Boston Marathon bombing, the release of three kidnapped women who were held in Cleveland, and the verdict of George Zimmerman," The Huffington Post continued. Also Jodi Arias, who was found guilty of murder, had her trial scrutinized by mainstream media for months.
An important event in April was the Boston Marathon twin bombings. Boston authorities were able to use video footage and witness statements to help identify two brothers 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev and 19-year-old Dzhokhar were responsible for detonating two pressure cooker bombs near the finish line on April 15. It was seen as the first terror attack on U.S. soil since 9/11.
Days later, Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in a gun battle with police. His brother, Dzhokhar, was found hiding in a boat behind a Watertown, Massachusetts home. He was arrested and transported to a local hospital where he was treated for multiple gunshot wounds. He will face trial in 2014.
Court trials in 2013 included the Ariel Castro kidnappings and the guilty verdict reached in the Jodi Arias trial.
Authorities in Cleveland Ohio received a phone call from abductee Amanda Berry in April. Berry had been kidnapped by Ariel Castro over ten years ago.
"I've been kidnapped and I've been missing for ten years... I'm here [and] I'm free now," Berry said in the 911 call.
Berry and two other missing women, Georgina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, were held captive for years in Ariel Castro home DNA testing confirmed that Castro was the biological father to Berry's child.
Castro initially entered a not-guilty plea, but later he pleaded guilty to 937 of the 977 charges against him, and was sentenced to life in prison without the chance of parole, plus 1,000 years.
Castro, however, was found hanging by a bed sheet in his prison cell on September 3.
The George Zimmerman trial also captivated the nation's attention. The former neighborhood watchman was found not guilty of second degree murder charges in the death of 17-year-old Travon Martin.
Zimmerman's attorneys argued that he had been attacked by Martin, and had acted in self-defense, in accordance with Florida's controversial Stand Your Ground law. Prosecutors argued he was a "wannabe cop" who profiled Marin. A jury, made up of six women, found Zimmerman not guilty for manslaughter and second degree murder charges.
The Jodi Arias trial ended with a guilty verdict against the 32-year-old for the murder of her her ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander. Arias was accused of stabbing Alexander "30 times, shooting him in the head and cutting his throat at his Mesa Arizona home on June 4, 2008."
While Arias was found guilty on May 8, jurors have het to determine whether she will serve a life in prison or receive the death penalty.
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