As the 10th anniversary of the Boston Marathon Bombing approaches, Netflix unveils on Wednesday Floyd Russ's new 3-part documentary whose title says it all: "American Manhunt: The Boston Marathon Bombing."
After the shock of four innocents murdered and hundreds wounded, the police, the FBI, the city and the nation wanted to know who and why. It took five days. First, authorities identified the brothers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev as having planted and exploded two home-made bombs near the finish line. A subsequent massive search concluded with Tamerlan dead and Dzokhar in custody (and subsequently tried, convicted and, since 2022, sentenced to die).
"American Manhunt" interviews the principals, reveals extraordinary background information on the brothers as it follows the nightmarish day by day search. We see the divisions – the FBI did not want to reveal that they knew who the bombers were until they had found them. The police, however, felt they were at a standstill and went public because they needed their help.
Rousted from their hideout, their faces suddenly everywhere, the Tsarnaevs killed MIT police officer Sean Collier and hijacked a car to run to New York where they would explode more bombs. Danny Meng, the car's owner, was driving with them for an hour before he escaped. He remains haunted by how close he came to dying.
"You know, it's not easy for us to get anybody to talk about such a serious event, but the point was we do it 10 years later, because we're talking about reflection," Russ said in a Zoom interview.
"Hopefully, there is some sense of closure at this point, which is going to be different for everybody.
"Everybody who decides to be a part of this documentary, most of them have some form of trauma. Definitely, the first-hand accounts of people who were there that day: the victims and survivors, the heroes.
"These accounts are important because at this point, we're trying to figure out: Why did this happen? Why did these immigrants turn into terrorist bombers after living here for almost 10 years?"
"American Manhunt" highlights some lingering issues. Like, did Tamerlan kill his friend Brendan Mess by slicing his throat in what's called the Waltham triple murder?
"That remains unsolved," Russ noted. "The case is still open."
The Boston Marathon Bombing remains an important story to tell. "Hopefully, a lot of people want to learn things, but also I hope," said Russ, "it finds a new audience and a younger audience. People that were in middle school, elementary school when this happened and don't know the details.
"And even those that think they do, I think they will be surprised."
'American Manhunt: The Boston Marathon Bombing' streams on Netflix April 12
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