Boston Marathon bombing trial: 3 survivors describe chaos and injuries, as prosecution rests its case against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

The prosecution in the sentencing phase of the Boston Marathon bombing trial rest their case on 23 April, but not before bringing three more survivors to the stand. All three victims, Heather Abbott, Marc Fucarile and Steve Woolfenden, spoke about the chaos after the bombing and loosing their limbs to the explosions.

Abbott, one of 18 people who lost legs when the two pressure-cookers bombs placed by Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, told the jury she was waiting near the race's finish line when the first bomb exploded.

"I saw smoke and started hearing people scream and immediately what came to mind was footage I had seen on 9/11 when the [New York World Trade Center] buildings collapsed...Before I could even react, the second explosion occurred," she testified, according to Reuters. "I was catapulted through the front doors of the restaurant, which were open, and I landed on the ground in a puddle of chaos and glass and blood."

Thirty-six-year-old Fucarile, who lost his right leg, said he remembered pressure being put on his chest and the frantic screams of the nurse who was helping him.

Some of the most emotional testimony came from Woolfenden, who was with his three-year-old son Leo at the time of the bombing. After the first bomb went off, the cancer biologist said he attempted to get his son out, but was stopped by the second explosion.

"Leo was conscious, he was alive, he was bleeding from the left side of his head," he testified. "I thought, 'Well, let's get out of here.' And that's when I discovered my leg had been severed off."

His son was then grabbed by a passerby, Reuters reported. Woolfenden said that he then turned to his left and witnessed Denise Richard's comforting her son Martin, who became the youngest fatality of the attack.

"I saw Martin's face," he said. "I could see a boy that looked like he was fatally injured." Woofenden said he recalls Denise's cries over her son's body.

A fourth witness on Thursday, trauma and acute-care surgeon David King, told jurors that the 8-year-old's small stature made his vital organs very vulnerable to the bombs. The youngest victim died from blood lost on the side walk, but it did not happen instantaneously and he felt immense pain, King told jurors.

According to the Wall Street Journal, jurors also viewed video footage of the bombing right outside of Forum restaurant. The jury could hear a linked up audio recording of the crowds reaction between the first and second bombs exploded.

Members of the bomber's family arrive in Boston

The same jury that found Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty of all 30 federal charges relating to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and subsequent manhunt that left four dead and over 260 injured will be tasked with deciding if the 21-year-old is sentenced to death or life in prison. Tsarnaev's older brother Tamerlan died in a shootout with police four days after the bombings. The sentencing phase of the trial is expected to last at least four weeks.

According to NECN, several members of Tsarnaev's family arrived in Boston on 23 April. It is unclear if they will be called to the stand by the defence.