Cop Shot During Boston Marathon Attacks Says There's No Joy In Guilty Verdict, Just Relief

BOSTON — After the conviction of Boston Marathon bomber Dzohkhar Tsarnaev on all 30 counts was announced Wednesday, Richard "Dic" Donohue, a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority officer who was shot during the attacks, told BuzzFeed News that he expected the verdict.

"If it had gone any differently, I would have been floored," he said.

In the early hours of April 19, 2013, Donohue was shot in the leg during the firefight with the Tsarnaev brothers in Watertown, Massachusetts, three days after the marathon bombings. Bleeding from his groin on the pavement, Donohue almost died as another officer performed CPR on him at the scene.

A regular attendee at the trial, Donohue wasn't in the courtroom Wednesday to hear the verdict. Asked how he learned the news that Tsarnaev had been found guilty, he said, "On my phone, following on the Twitter."

Donohue said he and his wife, Kim, spent the day at their home outside Boston anxiously awaiting the verdict.

"All day when you hear it's coming out — I was amped up waiting," Donohue said. "I was just so excited and anxious beforehand, and it was a relief. The checks were in the right boxes."

A federal jury on Wednesday found Tsarnaev guilty of conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction — the top charge — and causing the deaths of Krystle Campbell, Officer Sean Collier, Lingzi Lu, and Martin Richard. The convictions make him eligible for the death penalty.

As he watched the tweets marking each of the counts as guilty, Donohue said he felt "satisfied, but not happy."

"None of this brings me any joy," he said. "I'm satisfied that the jury found the defendant guilty across the board."

Almost two years after the attack, Donohue said he's still recovering.

"It's been a long road," he said. "I have pain every day. It's something I live with and I deal with."

Donohue added that he and Kim had very little reaction as they sat at home following the news of the verdict. Then, once it was over, "we both looked at each other and said, 'That's it.'"

"You kind of wait until you get to [count] No. 30. When you get to No. 30, it's a huge relief," Donohue said.

Victims and surviving family members of those who were killed in the Boston Marathon bombing also applauded the jury's decision at a news conference Wednesday.

Speaking on behalf of the victims and their families, bombing survivor Karen Brassard told reporters that the legal process has been difficult, "but we've gotten through it together."

The trial now moves to the sentencing phase, when the jury will decide whether to impose a sentence of life in prison without parole or death.

Of the 30 counts Tsarnaev was found guilty of on Wednesday, 17 of them carry the possibility of the death penalty.