The governor of Massachusetts has signaled that the state will not release further information about welfare benefits paid out to Boston Marathon bombing suspects Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.
Gov. Deval Patrick's administration on Thursday flatly refused to answer any media inquiries about taxpayers money that funded the suspected bombers, citing the Tsarnaevs right to privacy.
On Wednesday, state officials had confirmed that the deceased suspect, 26-year-old Tamerlan, received welfare benefits. They also said the brothers' family had relied on state benefits when they were children.
Suspects: State officials will not comment on the taxpayer money that was shelled out in welfare benefits for bombing suspects Tamerlan Tsarnaev, left, and his brother Dzhokhar, right
News that one of the alleged terrorist had received state money sparked outrage in the community, recovering after the blasts on April 15 that left 3 dead and more than 260 injured.
On Wednesday, after persistent questions from the Boston Herald, Massachusetts Office of Health and Human Services officials revealed that Tamerlan Tsarnaev lived off state aid while his wife, Katherine Russell Tsarnaev, worked as a home healthcare worker.
His 24-year-old wife would sometimes clock as many as 80 hours a week while her unemployed husband stayed at home.
Ultimately his wife's income made the couple ineligible for welfare and they stopped receiving state money in 2012.
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But on Thursday, multiple state agencies, seemingly at the prompting of the Patrick administration, refused to comment further on benefits received by the brothers.
When asked if Tamerlan had received unemployment benefits, Labor department spokesman Kevin Franck refused to comment, saying the matter was 'confidential and not a matter of public record,' The Herald reported.
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth spokesman Robert Connolly also refused to comment on the financial aid application of 19-year-old sophomore Dzhokhar.
'It is our position - and I believe the accepted position in higher education - that student records including academic records and financial records (including financial aid) cannot under federal law be released without a student’s consent.'
The Federal Communications Commission would not discuss whether the suspected bombers had a government-paid cellphone.
Housing officials in Cambridge also would not comment on if the brothers ever had Section 8 assistance, a rental subsidy offered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development to low income households.
Aid: It has been revealed that Katherine Russell, left, her husband Tamerlan Tsarnaev, right, and their young daughter Zahara relied on Massachusetts welfare benefits
Breadwinner: Lawyers for Katherine Russell (pictured in high school yearbook photos) said the 24-year-old mother worked tirelessly as a home healthcare aid to support her young family. Her husband was unemployed
The Herald had reported that sources who knew Tamerlan said that though he sported a flashy appearance, he failed to earn very much money for his family and was essentially a stay-at-home dad.
His younger brother, on the other hand, has been described as more entrepreneurial.
Dzhokhar, who was a sophomore at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, attended the school on a scholarship and earned petty cash selling marijuana, sources told the Boston Globe.
Investigators are scrutinizing the brothers' source of income, as they probe whether the pair received outside assistance for their attack, either from a radical group or foreign government.
Security experts have noted though that the modus operandi was relatively cheap, estimating that the materials for each of the pressure cooker bombs used at the Boston Marathon attack could have cost a total of $100 each.
Wife: Katherine Tsarnaeva, pictured leaving her lawyer's office in Providence, R.I. on Tuesday, met Tamerlan in 2009 at a nightclub. They married in June 2010, when she was 21-years-old
Family. Katherine Russell Tsarnaev, center at the home of her parents in North Kingstown, R.I. on Sunday, has a 3-year-old daughter, Zahara, with her late husband
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It is not known when Tamerlan and his wife, the mother of the couple's 3-year-old daughter, began receiving the aid.
They 'were not receiving transitional assistance benefits at the time of the [Boston Marathan blasts],' Massachusetts Office of Health and Human Services spokesman Alec Loftus told the Boston Herald.
Both suspects believed to be behind the bombings, Tamerlan and his brother, Dzhokhar, had also received welfare as children.
Their parents, Anzor Tsarnaev and Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, relied on state assistance when they moved to America from the Russian republic of Dagestan.
Tamerlan, 26, died early on April 19 after a shoot-out with police in Watertown, Mass. His 19-year-old brother was captured late on April 19 after an extensive manhunt.
State officials have been reluctant to discuss whether the Tsarnaevs had received state money when they immigrated to the U.S. in the early 2000s.
Ultimately, after pressure from the press the state welfare benefits office divulged the information to the Herald.
Marriage: Tamerlan Tsarnaev, in 2009 at Boston's Wai Kru Mixed Martial Arts center, was unemployed. Friends say he and his wife had a tempestuous relationship and said he would call Katherine a 'slut' and 'prostitute'
Officials believe that Tamerlan became heavily influenced by radical Muslim ideology sometime between 2008 and 2009 before he met his future wife.
A lawyer for the 24-year-old said she was a student at Suffolk University in Boston when she was introduced to Tamerlan at a nightclub, believed to be sometime during 2009.
Katherine Russell Tsarnaev converted to Islam to marry the terrorist suspect in June 2010, when she was 21-years-old
Around the same time, Russell became pregnant with Tamerlan's baby. She dropped out of school in her senior year and reportedly began pulling away from her friends and family.
After their marriage, she lived with Tamerlan, 'raising her child and working long hours, caring for people in their homes who are unable to care for themselves,' her lawyers said in a statement.
Her husband reportedly looked after their young child, Zahara.
Friends have told the media that the couple had a tempestuous relationship.
Three of Russell's friends told National Public Radio's Laura Sullivan that Tsarnaev would often insult Russell and call her names, such as 'slut' and 'prostitute.'
He was known to fly into into fits of rage where he would throw objects, including furniture, friends said.
Tsarnaev was shot during a dramatic gunbattle with cops in Watertown, Massachusetts on Friday, before police said he was run over by his younger brother Dzhokhar as he tried to escape.
ABC News has reported that so far, neither his wife - Katherine Russell - nor other family members have claimed his body for burial.