TIME reports the cousin was interrogated about Tamerlan for the first time on May 5. Coincidentally, on May 5, another distant cousin of Tamerlan and Dzokhar Tsarnev, Said-Khusein Tsarnaev, who is a photojournalist at a Novasti, the Russian news organization in Caucasus, reports he was stopped on the way back from a sports assignment in a taxi and temporarily detained at a traffic checkpoint between Dagestan and Chechnya, after showing his passport. Pretty harrowing story.
"At the exit post 'Gerzel' from Dagestan to Chechnya, the fixed-route taxi was stopped for inspection. Two men in civilian clothes asked all men to show their passports. Meanwhile, the power agents failed to introduce themselves," Said-Khusein Tsarnaev said.
According to his story, the power agents read his data in his presence; however, they did not return his passport. The power agents returned to the fixed-route taxi with two armed men in camouflage and asked the photojournalist to leave the fixed-route taxi, saying: "You are detained."
"I began to find out the reason for my detention. They told me that I 'know it myself' and asked to leave the fixed-route taxi to have a conversation with them. I refused. I realized that my situation was desperate, and I appealed to passengers of the fixed-route taxi. I said that my surname was Tsarnaev and that I was a photojournalist of the RIA 'Novosti'. I said that if I was detained at the moment, then I would most likely disappear. Immediately, I began phoning my colleagues in Grozny, Makhachkala, and I phoned to the Moscow office of the RIA 'Novosti'," Said-Khusein Tsarnaev said.
According to his story, someone of his colleagues journalists managed to get through to the Chechen Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA), and the problem was resolved. The photojournalist believes that the incident at the exit post was caused by his surname. He has confirmed that he is a distant relative of Tamerlan and Johar Tsarnaev; however, he never saw them.
It seems increasingly evident that Tamerlan Tsarnaev's views were not the product of his time in Russia. No one there shared his views. No one he associated with showed any interest in an attack in the U.S. Their beef is with Russia. Nor are they the product of You Tube or the Internet, as this Rolling Stone article yesterday points out. More likely, terror wannabes visit the internet sites after their views have already been formed.
It is virtually impossible to predict who will or won't engage in violence based solely on their beliefs.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Increasing the Government's arsenal of surveillance tools is unlikely to find the next lone misfit bent on violence. It will only make the rest of us less free.
