NEW YORK — — A man who killed eight people along a New York City bike path five years ago left behind a “scene of destruction and horror" where “screams filled the air" before telling an FBI agent he was proud of the destruction he caused and wished the flag of his terrorist group could be put in his hospital room, a prosecutor said at a trial's start.
Li described the “scene of destruction and horror" in which mangled bicycles were strewn along a popular path and “screams filled the air" while survivors “staggered around, wounded and dazed," searching for their family and friends. Among the victims was a family visiting from Belgium and 10 friends from Argentina.
Li said Saipov meant the shout to be “celebratory." He was shot by a police officer and arrested at the scene along the West Side Highway. The trial comes after a six-month-long jury selection process aimed at weeding out those individuals who cannot be impartial. In 2001, just weeks before the Sept. 11 attacks, a jury in Manhattan federal court declined to impose death on two men convicted in the deadly bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa.