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Bombing might provide leads in 2011 slaying

BOSTON (AP) - Authorities in a Boston suburb said they would investigate if any links turn up between a suspect in last week's Boston Marathon bombing and an unsolved 2011 slaying.

Middlesex County District Attorney's Office spokeswoman MaryBeth Long said on Monday that her office will not reveal details of its investigation or say whether there's new information, but said investigators would follow up if the bombing probe provides any new clues into the slaying.

On Sept. 12, 2011, three men were found in a Waltham apartment with their necks slit and their bodies reportedly covered with marijuana.

One of the victims, 25-year-old Brendan Mess, was a boxer and friend of Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the 26-year-old bombing suspect who was pronounced dead Friday after a shootout with police. His younger brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, was arrested Friday and on Monday was charged with conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction.

Mess' brother, Dylan, said on Saturday that he and his brother both knew Tsarnaev, but declined to talk about him.

And Charles Paquette, the owner of the Waltham house where the bodies were found and where Brendan Mess was a tenant, said he met some of Mess' boxer friends but does not know if Tamerlan Tsarnaev was among them.