Rolling Stone magazine sales soared for its controversial "Boston Bomber" August 2013 edition, despite backlash and the decision by retailers and readers to boycott the publication for putting the bombing suspect on its cover. 

Figures released by the Magazine Information Network show sales in July jumped by 102 percent over average per issue sales in the past year, according to The Independent. More than 13,000 copies of the issue were sold in news-stands, which more than doubles the sales average for the previous year. The data was reportedly based on copies purchased from 1,420 retailers between July 19-29, numbering 13,232. 

The controversial magazine cover featured a picture the 19-year-old bombing suspect took of himself. Tsarnaev's image was accompanied by the headline "The Bomber," followed by the subhead, "How a popular, promising student was failed by his family, fell into radical Islam and became a monster." The article, written by Janet Reitman, contained interviews with childhood friends and teachers who knew Tsarnaev. The report included details about Tsarnaev's devotion to Islam, his troubled life at home and his older brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev's "growing mental instability." 

After the cover photo was released to the public, "Boycott Rolling Stone" becoming a trending Twitter topic and many attacked the magazine for trying to "legitimize a mass murderer" and glorify terrorists. 

Retailers such as CVS and Walgreens chose not to sell the magazine in their stores, annouced July 17 on their respective Facebook pages. Rolling Stone released a statement that same day defending its decision to put Tsarnaev on the cover of its August issue, citing its respect of journalistic standards to report on all relevant and current news.

"The cover story we are publishing this week falls within the traditions of journalism and Rolling Stone's long-standing commitment to serious and thoughtful coverage of the most important political and cultural issues of our day," the magazine's editors wrote in the statement. "The fact that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is young, and in the same age group as many of our readers, makes it all the more important for us to examine the complexities of this issue and gain a more complete understanding of how a tragedy like this happens."

Tsarnaev pleaded not guilty to 30 charges in early July, including the use of a weapon of mass destruction to kill three people. He and his brother Tamerlan detonated two pressure cookers filled with explosives and other harmful objects near the finish line of the Boston marathon on April 15. Tamerlan died days later in a shoot-out with police.

Dzhokhar is also charged in the shooting death of a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean A. Collier, who encountered the Chechen brothers the night they robbed a gas station following the explosion. If convicted, he could face the death penalty or life in prison.

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