Eye to eye with Boston bomber

He looked into a killer's eyes, hidden behind sunglasses, minutes before the bombs went off at the Boston Marathon last week and destroyed both his legs.

Jeff Bauman, 27, a victim in the terror attack whose horrific image was captured in a now iconic photograph, helped the Federal Bureau of Investigation identify one of the bombers after he woke up at the Boston Medical Center, a report on the Daily Mail said yesterday.

Jeff, who was waiting near the end of the finish line to greet his girlfriend, Erin Hurley, a participant in the race, asked for a paper and pen upon waking up and wrote: “Bag, saw the guy, looked right at me.”

Chris Bauman told Bloomberg News that his brother, Jeff, scribbled that a man wearing a hooded shirt looked directly at him as he waited near the finish line then dropped a bag on the ground two minutes before the explosion that killed three
people and wounded around 180.

That man would turn out to be Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older of two brothers tagged in the Boston Marathon bombing. A firefight with Boston police last Saturday left the elder Tsarnaev dead.

Chris said despite Jeff's horrible injuries and strong pain medication, he vividly recalled details leading up to the blast, which were used by law enforcers as they went through footage of the event.

The Bauman family learned about Jeff's injury through photographs circulated by the media showing him being rushed to an ambulance by bystanders.

"I've had many times alone with him, and yes, he told me every single detail," Chris told Bloomberg News.

Multiple images and three videos of two men identified as suspect 1 and suspect 2 – the chief persons of interest in the Monday bombings – were released by the FBI.

Investigators believe that the two suspects, who are seen wearing backpacks in the images and video, planted explosive devices at two locations along the finish line of the race.

FBI Special Agent Richard DesLaurier had appealed to the public for any information, however insignificant, that could lead them to the suspects.

Meanwhile, his family and friends have created a Facebook page for Jeff to support him in his recovery, the Daily Mail report further said.

A family friend wrote on the page that Jeff is "doing awesome, another successful surgery and he's talking, making jokes and in very good spirits."