Tewksbury Residents Felt Relief, Pride As Second Bombing Suspect Caught

Like the rest of Greater Boston, Tewksbury residents were on pins and needles for nearly 24 hours, as local, state and federal law enforcement hunted and engaged the two brothers believed to be responsible for the Boston Marathon Bombings on Patriots Day, as well as the murder of an MIT police officer from Wilmington, Thursday night.

When the capture of 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was announced Friday night, many residents say they felt like they could finally exhale.

"We were out walking and someone yelled, 'they got him!'" said Debbie Webb. "As we were walking by every house, you could see the TVs on and you could see they were all watching (the manhunt and capture). Every house had it on. It was kind of eerie. But at the same time there was relief."

Loretta Ryan was with a group at the Ninety-Nine Restaurant on Route 38 Friday night. She said the TVs were tuned into the manhunt.

"There were about 10 or 11 of us, parents and kids and when they announced the news (of the capture) everyone just started clapping and cheering," said Ryan. "I'd been getting kind of nervous that they wouldn't get him because it was getting close to nightfall."

Anne Marie Stronach, a former member of the Tewksbury Board of Selectmen, was especially nervous because her grown son Connor was in Brighton and was in "lockdown" on Friday. A friend of Connor's lives in Watertown, very close to where the suspects were engaged in a gun battle with police.

"He was seeing explosions outside his window," said Connor. "But then when he saw on the news, pictures of people with bullet holes in their desks, he decided to go into his hallway (away from the walls and windows)."

Stronach said she got so nervous that she finally had to just turn off the news until she heard Dzhokhar Tsarnaev had been taken into custody.

"I just think (the police) did a phenomenal job," she said.

The Boston Marathon bombings hit close to home for Stronach. Her niece was running in the marathon and was four blocks away at the time of the second explosion. And it turns out that her nephew had worked as a lifeguard with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev at the Harvard University pool.