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Amid reports that police had identified a second suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings as 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, many fake Twitter accounts popped up claiming to belong to the suspect. One of the fake handles @Dzhokhar_A, suggested the 19-year-old suspect was looking to avenge his dead brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who was killed by police officers during a manhunt launched early morning on Friday.
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"@Boston_Police I will kill you all as you killed my brother," was the first post on the account.
@boston_police I will kill you all as you killed my brother
— Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev (@Dzhokhar_A) April 19, 2013
The account was soon confirmed to be a hoax as it was only following the Boston Police Department, only began tweeting today and uses one of the widely distributed photos of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.
Billy Baker, a reporter for the Boston Globe who initially encouraged officials and followers to look into the account later confirmed it was most likely fake.
The @dzhokhar_a is still active. Had spelled name wrong, which is why Twitter told me it didn't exist. Heavy indication that it's fake.
— Billy Baker (@billy_baker) April 19, 2013Advertisement
Another account using the handle @Dzhokhar_ also claimed to be the suspect. However, a Flickr user was quick to point out the account had gone by the name @FootyTube_ until early Friday.
According to Buzzfeed, Stefanie Gardner, who allegedly attended Cambridge Rindge and Latin School with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, confirmed his real Twitter account is @J_tsar.
The last post on the account was written on Tuesday, a day after the shooting, and reads, "Im a stress free kind of guy."
I'm a stress free kind of guy
— Jahar (@J_tsar) April 17, 2013
