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Boston Bomber Suspected in Triple Homicide

Two of the slain men in 2011 were Jewish

by
Adam Chandler
April 22, 2013
Erik Weissman.(Facebook)
Erik Weissman.(Facebook)

As more information becomes known about the suspects in last week’s bombing of the Boston Marathon, an ABC report says that authorities believe Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older suspect in the attack who died in a shootout with police, may have been responsible for a triple homicide back in 2011. The three killed were Brenden Mess, one of Tsarnaev’s friends and sparring partners, as well as two Jewish men, Erik Weissman and Raphael Teken, whose affiliations with the others seem unknown. More on Mess and Tsarnaev:

The two sparred together at an Allston, MA gym called Wai Kru. The gym’s head trainer, John Allan, provided a statement to the Boston Globe via Facebook message saying that Tamerlan “came into the gym to spar from time to time.”



Tsarnaev and Mess lived just a few blocks apart in Cambridge, in the same predominantly Russian neighborhood. Authorities believe there were times Mess crashed at Tsarnaev’s apartment.



It was unclear if Tsarnaev knew the other men slain, Raphael Teken, 37, and Erik Weissman, 31.

The investigation of the extremely grisly murders–I’d advise against reading the report if you don’t have a strong constitution–yielded few leads over the course of the past year.

According to a few accounts, Teken grew up in Brookline, went to Brandeis, and was buried in Israel. Last week, friends of Erik Weissman wrote on a memorial page on Facebook that the senselessness of the marathon attack had reminded them of Weissman’s death, about which little remained known.

Adam Chandler was previously a staff writer at Tablet. His work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Atlantic, Slate, Esquire, New York, and elsewhere. He tweets @allmychandler.