Jury Selection Begins For Boston Bombing Case

The jury selection for the case of Dzhokar Tsarnaev, suspect in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, has begun in a Boston federal courthouse.

According to local media outlets, Tsarnaev, 21, sat silently as Judge George A. O'Toole Jr. began the jury selection in the federal courthouse that is just minutes away from where two pressure cooker bombs were detonated near the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon in Boston, Massachusetts.

According to NBC News, about 3,000 potential jurors were called to the federal courthouse to possibly be selected for the jury stand.

Judge O'Toole has told media outlets that he expects opening statements in the case to begin on January 26.

The jury selection that began this week started after lawyers defending Tsarnaev failed to convince Judge O'Toole to postpone the jury selection and move the case out of Boston due to regional bias. O'Toole said postponing the jury selection would prove too inconvenient for the 200 people who had already planned to arrive at the courthouse on Monday.

Tsarnaev, who was 19 at the time of the Boston Marathon bombing, is facing 30 charges related to the terrorist attack that killed three and injured over 250.

O'Toole reportedly told the first 200 jurors who arrived at the courthouse Monday that if they are selected for the case, they would have to be careful not to read about the trial in the media or speak with any media personnel.

"In essence, we have committed these decisions not to the judge, the press and certainly not to the mob," O'Toole told the prospective jurors, according to the New York Times. "We have committed these important decisions to ourselves."