American Nightmare: Katherine Russell Tsarnaev -- From All-American Girl to Bomber's Wife

[brentspeak]

Feel bad for the Russell family. Probably not what they expected when their supposedly bright daughter went away to college.

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20694041,00.html

Katherine Russell was a typical college student before she met Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

The daughter of an emergency room doctor, Katie, as she was called, grew up in a Christian household in North Kingstown, R.I., graduated at the top of her class at her high school in 2007, and said in her yearbook she wanted to go into the Peace Corps.

"The reason why I remember her is she was very nice and very smart," her North Kingstown High art teacher, Amos Trout Paine, tells the Associated Press. "She was ready to learn."

She is now known as the Boston Marathon bomber's widow.

snip

After high school, Katherine went to Suffolk University in Boston, a 90-minute drive north, and within a few years her friends and family were startled by a change in her behavior.

"She stopped seeing a lot of her friends and cut them off," says the family source. "She became very withdrawn and quiet. That took away a lot of what we knew of her."

Katherine converted to Islam. And on June 21, 2010, they married at a ceremony performed by Imam Taalib Mahdee, of Masjid al Qur'aan, in Boston's Dorchester area, according to the marriage certificate.

snip

Suffolk University records show she dropped out that same year. The couple had a daughter – the exact date of birth is not known – and moved in with Tsarnaev's parents and his brother, according to DeLuca, who notes that Katherine rarely saw the brother because he was in the dorms at college.

snip

Her attorney insists that she was not aware of her husband's alleged plans, and is devastated by the terrorist attack.

"As a mother, a sister, a daughter, a wife, Katie deeply mourns the pain and loss to innocent victims – students, law enforcement, families and our community. In the aftermath of this tragedy, she, her daughter and her family are trying to come to terms with these events," concludes the statement from DeLuca released Tuesday.