BOSTON BOMBING UPDATE; BOMBERS TARGETS TIMES SQUARE AND NEW YORK CITY-INVESTIGATOR

BOSTON BOMBING UPDATE; BOMBERS TARGETS TIMES SQUARE AND NEW YORK CITY-INVESTIGATOR

New York City was the next target for the Boston Marathon bombing suspects. It was a spontaneous idea, wounded suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, told investigators from his hospital bed.

He and his older brother Tamerlan, who died at age 26 while allegedly fleeing police last week, still had half a dozen bombs left. But a botched carjacking spoiled the impromptu road trip to Times Square, Tsarnaev said.

"We don't know that we would have been able to stop the terrorists had they arrived here from Boston," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. "We're just thankful that we didn't have to find out that answer."

Before forcing their way into the vehicle the night of April 18, the brothers shot dead a campus police officer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, police said.

The Mercedes SUV ran low on fuel, and when they pulled in to a service station, the vehicle's owner escaped. Shortly thereafter, police were on their trail, and authorities say the men were throwing the bombs out the vehicle's window at them.

Latest developments in the Boston bombings probe

A previous trip

There is no evidence that New York City is a target of a terror attack stemming from the Boston bombings, New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said. Still, he said authorities are investigating two visits that the surviving suspect made to New York City last year.

In one of those trips, in April 2012, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is photographed in Times Square. Another person pictured in that photo has been in federal custody for seven days, on alleged visa violations.

The man, whom a federal law enforcement source said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev shared a cell phone with, was originally detained April 19 with another person when federal agents swarmed a residence thinking the younger suspect might be inside, a federal law enforcement source said.

Neither of the two detained men -- both foreign exchange students from Kazakhstan at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, where Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was also enrolled -- has been linked to the Boston Marathon attack. Yet investigators hope they can better piece together the suspects' movements before and after the marathon.

Photos: Boston bombing suspects