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>> once i was told, momma, you know, it's the right religion. >>tamerlan's mother witnessed his transformation. >> i would like for you to be covered because islam is requiring for women to be covered, so i said it was really like a little not expected aspect, so i said give me some time, you know, tamerlan. >> last year tamerlan traveled back to his homeland, a region of russia rocked by ethnic violence and islamic extremism. when he returned to the united states six months later, he became more outspoken about his muslim faith. at the islamic society of boston cambridge mosque, tamerlan stoo...

>> there's a whole generation of chechens who grew up with their families being displaced, relatives being killed, and so on. >> reporter: thomas deweil has studied and written about the region. >> for most people that's just a traumatic experience, but obviously for a small minority this is something that is in their dna, that drives them. >> reporter: and like many displaced chechens tamerlan may have struggled to fit in. chechnya is still home to militant separatist groups. and the home tamerlan's father grew up in has been destroyed by war. the relatives still live here. tamerlan traveled ...

New convert to islam. >> reporter: that new convert, a muslim extremist right here, in the boston area. >> he said this person, just he took his brain, he brainwashed him completely. tamerlan is off now. there's not even any obedience and respect to his own father. >> reporter: the uncle says tamerlan told him he quit listening to music and got very conservative after talking to the extremist whose name was misha. tamerl tamerlan's mother says misha was a good influence on her son. >> when misha visited us, we just kind of -- he just opened our eyes, you know. really wide. about islam. he was ...

Tamerlan is off now. there's not even any obedience and respect to his own father. >> reporter: the uncle says tamerlan told him he quit listening to music and got very conservative after talking to the extremist whose name was misha. tamerlan's mother says misha was a good influence on her son. >> when misha visited us, we just kind of -- he just opened our eyes, you know. really wide. about islam. he was really -- he's devoted and he's a very good, nice man. >> reporter: dzhokhar tsarnaev, the surviving brother, told investigators that they conceived the attack and that they were self-radica...

That was kind of like the perception i got. flashy, confident, maybe cocky. i guess he backed it up in the ring. he could fight, he could punch. he could put a guy out. when the time was right if he had a big punch in him and the opening was there he could finish a guy. >> that ferocity apparently carried over outside the boxing ring. he was arrested that same year for slapping his girlfriend in the face during a fight over another woman. the following year, 2010, he married catherine russell, a suffolk university student he met in a nightclub and had dated on and off for several years. she co...