Eric Traub

Eric Traub testified for the defense on Day 59 about teaching Dzhokhar Tsarnaev mathematics in fall 2007 and fall 2010. He remembered a kind, engaged, well-liked student. A classroom photograph and his December 2010 college recommendation were admitted without objection. Traub read the letter's favorable assessments to the jury and affirmed that he still meant them.

Traub described shock at learning of Tsarnaev's involvement in the bombing. His knowledge of the family was limited: he had never met the parents, did not know about siblings, and allowed that the parents might have attended an open house. The judge sustained several objections to broader questions about Traub's thoughts and reflections. His denial that Tsarnaev had fooled him in high school remained after the prosecutor withdrew an objection.

On cross-examination, Steven D. Mellin elicited agreement that Tsarnaev was self-motivated, mature, and smart. Traub qualified self-motivation as a classroom observation and maturity as relative to a high-school student. The court then excused him. In her closing argument, Judy Clarke returned to Traub's recommendation and his continued endorsement of it as part of the defense's account of Tsarnaev's favorable school history.