2.Elmirza Khozhugov — Direct/Cross

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Hello.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: About that time, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I'm testifying from Almaty, Kazakhstan.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I'm in the U.S. Embassy in Almaty.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I do live in Almaty.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I was raised in Almaty, Kazakhstan, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I do work here now.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I have family here, wife and four children.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I work in a construction company that belongs to my father.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: In our company, I'm responsible for supply chain management and for construction materials.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, it is a family business.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Thank you. I spent a lot of time studying in the United States.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Can you repeat the question?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: First time I went to the U.S., I was 14 years old, and I spent five months in the U.S., in Maryland.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And then I went to college in the United States in 2004.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: It's in Washington State, Western Washington University.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I am connected to the Tsarnaev family because I was married to Ailina Tsarnaeva, the sister of Jahar.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And also my elder sister is married to Ruslan Tsarni, who is a cousin -- I'm sorry, who is an uncle on the father's side for Jahar.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, we have a son together. His name is Ziyaudi.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: They got married in December of 1999.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I was 13 years old.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: One of the members, the mother of Jahar and Tamerlan, I met on the wedding; and the rest of the family, I met about six to nine months after the wedding.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The difference is that Ruslan has decided to de-Russify his last name, basically take out the two last letters of his last name to make it sound more Chechen rather than more Russian.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That's right.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. I knew Tamerlan Tsarnaev much better than the rest of the family because he was my friend.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: When he first came to Almaty, Kazakhstan, he was introduced to me by Ruslan Tsarni. And we were the same age, and we had a lot of interests, a lot of things that interested both of us. So we spent a lot of time together. And I introduced him to my friends and to my neighbors, my classmates, and he has become friends with them as well.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: There was a time when Tamerlan stayed at Ruslan's place for about one year.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Before he went to the United States.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The mother, Zubeidat, and the father, Anzor, and the younger son, Jahar, they came to the U.S. first.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The other -- the other three children at that time lived with Ruslan Tsarni in Almaty, and they lived to the U.S. a year after the parents and Jahar did.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. Tamerlan was an interesting young man, polite, and good friend. He was charismatic, friendly, goofy sometimes, but, overall, he was just fun to be around with.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: My friends love him when he was around. And there were even times when I wasn't called to the party and he was.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I came to the U.S. in 2004, so about a year after -- a year and a half after they moved.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I lived in Ferndale, Washington, in the house that Ruslan Tsarni has bought a little while before that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And I lived there alone because --

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I lived there alone.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. I went to school and live in their house.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: In the first academic year that I went to college there, the family did visit me and, actually, not just the elder Tsarnaev family but also Ruslan Tsarni, along with my sister and their children came over. Maret Tsarnaev came over, who is an aunt to Jahar. And also Zubeidat, Bella, and Ailina Tsarnaev came over.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: They came separately but at the same time.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I do have it.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: On that picture, you can see myself hugging Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, the mother of Jahar. On the side there is Naina Tsarni, the daughter of Ruslan -- the eldest daughter of Ruslan.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yeah.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. That's the first visit they made in the first year of my school.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: This isn't the first time I met her, but it's the first time I met her in the United States.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I met her at the wedding, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: During that trip, we have all met again, I would say. And during that stay, I have become interested in Ailina, and we started having sort of dates.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, we would go out.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: 3494.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Uh-huh.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: On the far left, it's Hussein, the cousin of Jahar, and he is son of Alvi Tsarnaev, the eldest son in the family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And second one is Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the elder brother of Jahar. Third on the left is Andy Tsarnaev and son of Alvi, the cousin of Jahar. When I said Hussein -- I meant Hussein is the son of Molkan, the sister of Ruslan Tsarni. Next on the picture is Bella Tsarnaeva, the elder sister of Jahar. Then it goes the mother of Jahar, Zubeidat. Then there's Jahar himself. And on the far right is Ailina Tsarnaeva, Jahar's sister and my ex-wife.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Judging by the clothing they're wearing, I can tell that this picture was taken after they visited us in Washington because some of the clothing that Ailina is wearing is the one that she actually bought -- she actually got in Washington, and I was there when she was buying it.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. After they left and I think about five to six months passed -- so it was my second academic year -- that's when Tamerlan visited me.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Can you repeat the question?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Oh, yes. Tamerlan flew in because he had a break from school, and I had a short break as well. And we just spent time together. I showed him my college. I showed him where I lived. I showed him the area, the lakes around, the mountains around, and the -- I was trying to convince him to move to Washington so that, first of all, we could be closer as a family. I was trying to convince him and the rest of the family to move but him first. And then as well I wanted him to go to the same college as I did, so I was trying to convince him that it's going to be a good idea to go.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Tamerlan felt like it's a good idea. He did consider it, and he did say that he would discuss it with his parents when he goes back.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: No, he did not.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. As I was driving him back to the airport when he was leaving, I asked him that -- I told him that I had feelings to his sister, and I asked him if he would mind if I was -- if I would have a relationship with her, to which he answered, as long as it has good intentions, he wouldn't mind it.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is correct.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Excuse me?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: At that time exactly, probably not. It was -- in perspective, yes, maybe, but for that, it was just talking relationship.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We were four years -- I'm four years older than her.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: She was 15, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Do I consider myself what exactly?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Oh, yes, yes. Tamerlan was my only friend in the U.S. at that time, and he was also my friend from my home country. So we shared a lot of things in common.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. On that picture, it's Tamerlan on the left and me on the right.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, since we were communicating mostly through emails, we were sending pictures of each other to each other. And one day I just felt like it would be a good thing to have a picture together and since at that point in time we didn't meet yet. So I took two photographs, and I added them to each other on my computer, and I emailed it back to him.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: On the top of that -- of this picture is mine and his nicknames we had at that time. For him, it goes "the professor," and for me it's "the Chechenian."

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Given that -- huh?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Given our age, we were having -- we were giving ourselves nicknames as what we would like to be identified with, what we would like to be called. Tamerlan chose for himself the professor because that would make him sound smarter and wiser than others around him. And my nickname is the Chechenian, and I chose that because I felt like our ethnicity, the name of our ethnicity, is usually mispronounced as Chechens. So the right way would be Chechenian, so that's why I had the nickname.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, we did, in July of 2006.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We got married in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I was 20 years old and she was 16 years old.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Uh-huh.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, it's me and Ailina. And this picture was taken in Washington, in the Bellevue Square Mall in Washington, and at that point in time, we are already married.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I can tell because I am hugging her on that photograph.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And if I wasn't married to her, I wouldn't be hugging her, exactly.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Because that would be inappropriate thing to do before marriage.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The marriage lasted for almost two years.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, there has been that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. We had an argument considering some contacts that I found in her Facebook account. So because of that, I lost my temper and basically put my hands on her.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: As a result of that, I got arrested.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And eventually we got divorced. We got separated.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Her elder brother Tamerlan came over. He bailed me out and flew in, and he stayed with us for about ten days, maybe two weeks.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He did talk to me during his stay, and he tried to advise me to be more patient, to stay calm, and to not pay too much attention if the young sister of his is behaving badly. So he was trying to help, yes. That's what I'm trying to say.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, partially, it was because we both were young, and part of it was our family who got in between our relationship.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, we had one child, a son.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: His name is Ziyaudi.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Z-i-y-a-u-d-i.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Ziyaudi.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We call him Zia.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: During 2006 and 2008?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, we were in Washington State.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, every spring -- every break we had, spring break, fall break, we would go there. Either she would go up first and then I would join or we would go there together.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: During these two years, I visit them for about four to six times.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Every time it was about ten to fourteen days.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: They lived in 410 Norfolk Street in Cambridge, and it's basically -- it was basically a floor of a house, the third floor of a house, very old house. And they had two bedrooms there, a kitchen, and a small living room.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: And it was a small place to live in. It was always crowded.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The relationship between the parents wasn't an example one, I would say. It was obvious that neither of them wanted to give in, so they had a lot of conflict. They had a lot of arguments and conflicts coming out of those arguments. And for the most part, I would say that the mother, Zubeidat, had more authority in the family than the father did.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Zubeidat loved her son and she showed it, and she would always praise him and encourage him to do things that he wanted to do actually. And in return, Tamerlan loved his mother very much. He respected her, and he would listen to her more than to anyone else in the family or out of the family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: It's Zubeidat on the left and Tamerlan on the right.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He's probably around 13, 16 years.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I'm not --

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: No, not for sure.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, it is reflective. Tamerlan is hugging his mother on that picture, and he would hug her every day. A few times he would just come up and hug his mother and tell her that he loves her, and he's showing that he defending her maybe.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I have seen Jahar.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: At the time when I was visiting the family, I would see Jahar every time I was there. So for the most time that he was in the house, he would spend his time studying. He would have his textbooks out on the table. He would be reading or writing. He wasn't very interested, I'd say, in the computer. He was spending a lot of time with books. And the mother would put up his good grades, and she would put it on a magnet on the fridge so the whole fridge was his successful grades and all that stuff.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He was really quiet, quiet and, again, polite, just as Tamerlan was at that age. And he was patient and he studied well. He spent -- he was responsible for whatever he did. He never -- I have never seen him or heard of him being in any inappropriate situation, I would say.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The last -- one of the last visits that I made is when I met a friend of Tamerlan or, like, a mentor. His name was Misha. And he was an Armenian guy who converted to Islam, and he was pretty much just preaching to Tamerlan about Islam.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, that is correct.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: They would talk about politics; again, religion, and concerning religion itself, they would discuss things like hearing demons talk and talking to demons, and to jins, is what they called in Islam. Misha was telling in cases it was possible to hear the jins and in which cases it was not possible.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I wouldn't call it formally a lesson, but he was teaching him and suggesting books to read, I guess, and just kind of expressing his own views about that faith to Tamerlan.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: No one actually participated in those conversations. They were usually left alone. And even I, when I was a guest there, I didn't spend much time with them because I didn't like these conversations. But Misha was welcome by the mother, by Zubeidat, to come in any time to talk to Tamerlan. And there was even one situation when it was late night, and Misha and Tamerlan were in the kitchen talking about religion again. And at that late time, Anzor came home from work, and he had to get to the shower. And he -- to get to the shower, he would have to go through the kitchen. And Zubeidat stop him in the hallway and said, Don't go in there. You're going to interrupt them talking. And Anzor would say, Why is he so late at night? I think it was, like, 2 or 3 a.m. Why is he so late at night in my house? Why are they not sleeping? Why are they talking? She said, Don't bother them -- Misha is teaching your son good things so don't interrupt it. Just wait until they leave, and then you can go take a shower.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, for me, these talks about religion are not particularly interested when they intermix these talks with politics and conspiracy theories and Satanism. So I just generally don't pay attention to people who talk much about religion.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Because I believe faith is for one own, not for showing off.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. After this visit -- well, during that visit and after I would talk with Tamerlan about who's this Misha? Why are you listening to him? He would defend Misha as if he was a good person, and he just converted to Islam so he has a lot of background to learn from. So after I left, I used to call Tamerlan again and again. And one call I ask him, So how is your boxing? How are you doing in boxing? And he says, you know, I quit boxing. I ask him, Why would you quit boxing? You love it. This is the goal of your life to box, to become a professional boxer. Why would you stop? His answer to me was, Misha said to me, in Islam, hitting people in the head is not a good thing to do so we shouldn't be doing it. And that raised concerns for me, of course. So I talked to him more about it, and I said to him he should do what he loves, but I guess he didn't listen. And then the other conversation I had with him is he started -- he was taking some acting classes in some community college, I believe. And he would also do music with his friends. And when I ask him, So how is this thing going? How is your music? He said, I quit music, too. I go, Why would you quit music? You used to play the piano since you were a kid. Why would you quit it? He says, again, Misha says that music is not appropriate in Islam, so we shouldn't be playing music or listening to music. And the same thing pretty much happened with his acting classes. He also quit because he didn't have time for it. He needed more time to learn about Islam.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I didn't hear what you said in the beginning of the question. Could you repeat it?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Did he act unusually, did you say?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He did talk to me a lot about religion itself in general and particularly about conspiracy theory, and he was getting into that a lot. He showed me some videos on the internet about that stuff. He was hoping to find some books to read about conspiracy theory. It did seem interesting to him. He did seem like he had a goal to actually find out what is happening around the world, how it is connected with politics and how it is connected with big businesses and how -- what place he has and religion has in between all of that. He was searching for this kind of stuff, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, of course, I did.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, Tamerlan loved his younger brother, absolutely adored him. And he always tried to show it, and he always tried to put himself as a -- as well as with the mother, the defender of Jahar. His older brother is leader, I guess. Tamerlan himself was very charismatic, and he was a leader within himself. And he was -- it was an easy thing for him to be the elder brother. He would -- every day he would talk to Jahar about how he's doing in school and how he should be doing. And then they would spend time just by themselves, like, you know, walking outside, talking. And for most of the time when I spoke to Tamerlan about Jahar, Tamerlan just couldn't -- he couldn't find enough words to express his love to his younger brother and to express how much he's ready to do in order for Jahar to be successful in life, for Jahar to be happy in his life.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Again, I can't hear you well. I'm sorry.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Oh, well, Jahar, him being the younger brother, he -- of course, he listened to Tamerlan. He went along any time Tamerlan would say let's go do this and that. He would just go along and always find time to actually go along. He would be a good younger brother, I would say, as he was supposed to be in the Chechen family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: There is a saying we have in Chechnya which goes like, it is -- in a family with seven sons, it is better to be a dog than the youngest son, meaning that the youngest of the boys is obliged to do the things that the other boys tell him. So he had to obey every order that the elder brother say, any of them, any of the six brothers. So in a way it's better to be a dog because then you wouldn't be able to do so many things because you're a dog and not a human.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Did I what?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: My son stayed in the U.S. when I left for -- when we separated. Yes, he stayed with them, with the Tsarnaev family. Is that --

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: -- what your question? I didn't hear your question well actually.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Uh-huh, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Oh, yes, yes, he did. Zubeidat Tsarnaeva brought him on a flight from Boston to Almaty. She brought him to stay with me for a few months, two months or three months, I believe.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I do not remember the exact date, but Ziyaudi was about two and a half years old.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: April of 2007, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: April 15, 2007.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Maybe a little later, maybe a little later than that, 2010 -- 2010 probably.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. When I met her in the airport, I was a little bit surprised by her clothing because she had all of her body covered with clothing. Basically, she dressed up as a good Muslim woman would.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Something like a hijab, yes. I can't say it was like the Arab hijab itself, but it was close to that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: To be honest, it actually made me laugh more than be surprised because, knowing that person, I know that wearing these clothes isn't going to change her, the way that she is actually. So I just saw it as an attempt to cover up what she has on her mind as if it could help.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I was finishing college in 2011. And as I was about to graduate, I have agreed with my ex-wife Ailina that on my way back to Kazakhstan that I'm going to make a stop in Boston and pick my son up and fly with him. And when I stopped by, we were supposed to meet at South Station in Boston. And when I arrived, I spent, like, six hours waiting there to see her to pick up my son. But she never came, and I couldn't get in touch with her by phone either because her phone was either off or she didn't answer. So I started trying to call each member of the family. So I called the father, the mother, and the sister Bella, and then eventually I got through to Tamerlan, and I briefly spoke to him. I told him the situation, that I'm here waiting for my son. Do you know about the whereabouts of Ailina and the boy? And he said, No, I don't know where they are, and I can't get in touch with them either. So then I told him, Hey, I have a few hours here. Would you mind driving down to the South Station and talk to me about things? Life has moved on. Maybe you have things to discuss now. And his answer to me was surprising, actually, that, you know, I'm just getting out of my house, and I have to go to the mosque. I have to do some things at the mosque. I have to help out people. So, no, I'm not going to meet you.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, it was surprising to me because usually, even though we have separated with his younger sister, we still kept a good relationship between ourselves. We didn't have a fight because we didn't have a conflict because of it. We still stayed -- I can't say we stayed good friends, but we were still in -- in -- at least in respect to each other.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: In fall of 2012.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: My younger brother was going to the same college as I was. And as he was finishing up his English program in the end of the summer, about that time, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva contacted my mother and told her that, if we wanted to, we could take Zia for a few months. So since my brother was already there, I told them that he's going to stop by in D.C. and take my son, and I asked them to bring Ziyaudi to D.C., to the airport. And eventually Jahar was the one who brought Zia to D.C. and gave him to my younger brother, and my younger brother flew with him to Almaty, Kazakhstan.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Oh, yes. Zia and Jahar, from the words of my son, Ziyaudi, Jahar is his older brother, and he was always around him when everyone would be either at work or somewhere else, at school. Jahar would be the one baby-sitting him. And they were like brothers.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I have it, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: On this picture, you can see my son on the left, Zia, and Jahar Tsarnaev on the right.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes. I believe, on that picture, they are either on the Skype talking to someone else in the family. So probably Jahar was starting up the computer to let Zia talk either with one of my family members or maybe with me even.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He's about -- about he was four year old, I would say, yes, about four years old in that picture.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yeah. It was about 2011, maybe fall of 2011.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: After that he was supposed to return, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: No, he did not return because later on we discussed it with Ailina. We decided that I might keep him for his birthday, which is April 15th. And, you know, on that date, on that exact date, the Marathon bombings happened. So a few days after the bombings, we found out who are the suspects. And after that, I decided that it's not a good idea to send my son over there at the moment.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Thank you.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Good evening. Good morning, actually, for you.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, April 15th, 2007.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He spent a lot of time in there, yes, as I am aware.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, the defendant was close to him.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He was supposed to come back to the United States after his birthday party here in Almaty.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Uh-huh, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I did grow up here, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Ethnicity?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I am Chechen.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is correct. I do not speak the Chechen language.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I do consider myself.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Fluent in the Chechen culture, absolutely.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Excuse me?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I do remember that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I do not recall me saying these exact words, but I may have said that, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is correct.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The children came and lived with him.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Tamerlan was there, and I believe Ailina and Bella were, too.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The defendant's parents were either on their way to the United States or already in the United States. I cannot say for sure because at that age I was not aware of all of what was happening in their family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Can you repeat the beginning of your question, please?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: In what respect?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I don't -- it's not a clear question.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He was supportive of the children, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He did pay for their school.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He -- yes, he did help with the weddings for both of the daughters of Anzor.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Ruslan was what? Excuse me.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, he did support him, of course.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Well, since I was living in his house, yes, he visited.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He didn't buy the house for me.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He just bought a house. And when it was time when I was about to go to college, he told me, Hey, there's this nice college right next to the place where I bought a house. Do you want to go there? And I said sure.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He was very supportive, absolutely.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He had financial -- what did you say?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Can you repeat the question, please?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Can you just speak more slowly? I can't catch the words so fast right now.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, he was the youngest.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: It is not very common that the youngest brother is the, so to speak, bread giver in the family. It is very unusual. And in most of the family that I know, usually it's the older brother who is supporting the younger children. But in respect to the Tsarnaev family, they just have a younger brother who outsmarted the rest of the family. And being that smart child in the family, he acts as if he's the eldest one, and he is trying to help the rest of the family. And it doesn't stop with his family. It also includes myself and my younger sister who is now living in his house and goes to college over there.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Smartest and most successful, I would say.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, he is.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Hussein as well.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Uh-huh, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He was very likable, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I don't know -- he didn't have many friends in the U.S. outside of the Chechen community in there.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Again, please speak a little more slowly because the outdoor here is a little bit noisy. When you separate your voice, I can hear it better.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, that happened.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He has become bigger at that point, yes, and still he was very friendly. And I would say he would be the heart of the party or the center of attention again, yeah.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, he told me that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: His parents -- his father encouraged him to stop boxing. He was encouraging him for a few years before he actually stopped.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: But when I spoke to him on the phone, particularly he said to me that Misha told him that it's not appropriate in Islam, and that's why he stopped.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: He started what?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That -- yeah, that happened, and he was boxing, I mean, professional boxing, like in his high school, I mean, not exactly professionally but boxing for titles, and then he would quit and try something else. He would work and not do as much boxing. And then again he would attempt -- make an attempt to start boxing professionally again. He would go to the gym, spend a lot of time there. And eventually he just -- make sure you know the time patterns when you ask these questions actually.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: My what with Tamerlan was in 2010?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Over the phone, it was in 2011, last contact.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We were separated by that time, yes.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, I did say that.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I did not have -- I was not supposed -- and I did not have a lot of contact with him as friends, but we were still family. And, yes, we did contact because we were family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: No. I was surprised because --

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: The reason -- I understand your question is about the reason why, because when I met him in 2010 and we were already separated with his sister, when I saw him, he hugged me and we did talk. And it was the same situation. I was picking up my son to take him with me, instead this time I was staying in D.C. with Ruslan. But a little more than a year later, what I get from him is, Hey, I'm busy with doing mosque things so, no, I'm not going --

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Yes, it is correct.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We contacted mostly with a -- me and the mother Zubeidat, we contacted a lot.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: She act as what?

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: We just contacted for discussions about my son primarily, and then in between we would discuss how is every person in the family doing at that point in time.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I did not have much physical contact with -- I mean, I didn't see them personally a lot. I did not talk to them a lot because it was not possible due to the distances. But in any way, they are my family and I am connected to them, not just through my son but also my sister who is married to their uncle. So we always knew about what's happening in between us. So it would be safe to say that we were informed of what was happening in the family.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is correct.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: I was getting information from the women in the family, I mean, my own sister and my -- and the grandmother of Jahar and Tamerlan, Liza and Zubeidat, too. The women, of course, find ways to talk to each other about what's happened. But given that Ruslan and Anzor didn't have the best relationship at this point in time, I couldn't get information from Ruslan. That's true.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is possible, that we only heard what she wanted us to hear.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: That is correct. We -- I was friends with his older brother, so I would spend more time with Tamerlan than with Jahar, of course.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Welcome.

ELMIRZA KHOZHUGOV: Okay. Thank you.