The day after two powerful bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, a mile-square area around Copley Square here remained cordoned off as a crime scene, and officials still had no one in custody.
Investigators searched a house in a nearby suburb late Monday night, but later said the search had proved fruitless.
Hundreds of runners who had expected to leave Boston on Tuesday morning with a sense of triumph after a night of celebration left instead with heavy hearts after at least three people were killed. The bombings also sent 176 people to area hospitals, including 17 who were critically injured, said Police Commissioner Edward Davis of Boston.
Among the dead was an 8-year-old boy, Martin Richard, of Dorchester, according to Conor Yunits, a family spokesman. Friends and family gathered Monday night at a restaurant to mourn him. He had been watching the marathon with his family, and his mother and a sister were badly injured. The names of the other victims have not been made public.
Late Monday night, law enforcement officials descended on an apartment building in the suburb of Revere, about five miles north of Copley Square, linked to a man the police took into custody near the scene of the bombings. But on Tuesday morning, one law enforcement official said investigators had determined that the man, who was injured in the blast and was questioned at the hospital, was not involved in the attack.
The authorities have not announced any arrests, and so far, no one has claimed responsibility as the police conduct what they said was “a criminal investigation that is a potential terrorist investigation.”
Law enforcement officials pleaded at a briefing Tuesday morning for anyone who took pictures or video of the finish line at the time of the blast to submit them to authorities.
The plea underscored just how pervasive cameras have become at events like the marathon and how crucial they can be in helping the police piece together crucial pieces of evidence. But it may also suggest how few clues the authorities have otherwise.
The police also said they were examining footage from nearby security cameras frame by frame as they continue their search for the identity of the person or persons who placed explosive devices at the end of the 26.2-mile course.
Commissioner Davis said that officials were gradually reducing the size of the crime scene, which now stretches for 12 blocks in Copley Square, down from 15 blocks on Monday. He said it was the most complex crime scene in the history of the department.
City streets that normally would be clogged at rush hour were largely deserted on Tuesday except for a cold wind and a few runners out for a morning jog. “It’s very surreal,” said Mary Ollinger, 32, who works at Wentworth Institute of Technology.
“The streets are empty and the Common is filled with media trucks.”
At rush hour, the city’s subway system was uncharacteristically quiet, watched over by a heightened police presence and SWAT team members. Parts of the city seemed to have ground to a halt: Stores on Newbury Street, Boston’s busy retail thoroughfare, were closed, and tables on the patio at Stephanie’s, a restaurant there, were still covered in dishes left there on Monday.
Metal barriers and more police guarded a 15-block crime scene around the blast, forming something of a black hole in a busy retail and business district in this city. Inside, the streets were still littered in the detritus of the marathon — runners’ blankets, water bottles, even a pile of bananas.
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