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Miranda rights concerns mount as Boston bombing suspect remains in serious condition

Published:Monday | April 22, 2013 | 12:00 AM
Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26 (left) and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev 19. The FBI says the two brothers are the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing, and are also responsible for killing an MIT police officer, critically injuring a transit officer in a firefight and throwing explosive devices at police during a getaway attempt in a long night of violence that left Tamerlan dead and Dzhokhar captured, late Friday, April 19. - AP FILE

 BOSTON (AP):

As the lone surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing lay hospitalised under heavy guard, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and a federal public defender raised concerns about investigators' plan to question 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev without reading him his Miranda rights.

What Tsarnaev will say and when are unclear. He remained in serious condition Sunday and apparently in no shape for interrogation after being pulled bloodied and wounded from a tarp-covered boat in a Watertown backyard. The capture came at the end of a tense Friday that began with his 26-year-old brother, Tamerlan, dying in a gunbattle with police.

United States officials said an elite interrogation team would question the Massachusetts college student without reading him his Miranda rights, something that is allowed on a limited basis when the public may be in immediate danger, such as when bombs are planted and ready to go off.

ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero said the legal exception applies only when there is a continued threat to public safety and is "not an open-ended exception" to the Miranda rule, which guarantees the right to remain silent and the right to an attorney.