Bill and Denise Richard, whose son Martin, eight, was killed in the attack two years ago urge authorities to take the death penalty off the table

The parents of the youngest victim of the Boston Marathon bombing say they do not want convicted killer Dzhokhar Tsarnev to be put to death.

In an op-ed for the Boston Globe, Bill and Denise Richard, whose eight-year-old son Martin was killed and seven-year-old daughter, Jane, lost a leg when two pressure-cooker bombs exploded near the marathon’s finishing line on 15 April 2013, urge the Department of Justice and federal authorities to take the death penalty off the table.

“We understand all too well the heinousness and brutality of the crimes committed,” they wrote. “The defendant murdered our eight-year-old son, maimed our seven-year-old daughter and stole part of our soul. We know that the government has its reasons for seeking the death penalty, but the continued pursuit of that punishment could bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives.”

Instead, Bill and Denise Richard ask that Tsarnaev, who they do not reference by name, spend the rest of his life in prison without parole without any right to appeal.

The family insist that they do not want the memories of Marathon Monday 2013 to be defined by Tsarnaev’s actions or beliefs, rather by “the resiliency of the human spirit”. They argue that if a death sentence was handed down, years of appeals would cause anguish for their children.

“As long as the defendant is in the spotlight,” they wrote, “we have no choice but to live a story told on his terms, not ours. The minute the defendant fades from our newspapers and TV screens is the minute we begin the process of rebuilding our lives and our family.”

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty of Boston bombing and may face death penalty Read more

Tsarnaev was found guilty of all 30 counts against him, including conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, for his role in the attack that left three people dead and 264 injured. Seventeen of those charges carry the death penalty.

The Richard family were in court to hear the guilty verdict read out, and had been present almost every day as the trial progressed in Boston.

Following the news that her son had been found guilty on all 30 charges, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva affirmed her belief in her son’s innocence, calling the US authorities “terrorists.”

The same jury which took a little more than 11 hours to convict Tsarnaev on all charges, will now decide whether to sentence him to death.

In the sentencing phase, the seven women and five men of the jury will hear more testimony. A vote for death, which must be unanimous, would see Tsarnaev moved to a federal facility in Indiana to eventually be executed.

Massachusetts ruled capital punishment unconstitutional more than three decades ago. Finding the jury for the case took more than two months, partly because the 12 jurors – and six alternates – had to be “death-qualified”, meaning neither opposed nor in favor of the death penalty.