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There was the following statement in (April 24) Time magazine’s article titled, “Thanks for dumb terrorists” reporting the capture of Boston bomb attack suspects: http://swampland.time.com/2013/04/21/give-thanks-for-dumb-terrorists/#ixzz2REueMOq5

“Why had they not already killed him? If the allegations against the Tsarnaevs are true, they were obviously quite capable of killing in cold blood. Assuming they had his ATM pin number, the owner of the Mercedes no longer served any obvious use to them. What’s more, he knew exactly who they were: The Tsarnaevs had reportedly identified themselves as the marathon bombers.”

What difference would come up by saying “Why had they not already killed him?” instead of a simpler version, “Why didn’t they kill him (then)”? Is there a very big difference?

As we don’t have ‘the past perfect tense – have /had +p.p.’ mode in our language, it’s pretty difficult for me to discern the exact difference of the nuance of messages in two different tenses.

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  • At a glance it looks like the sentence was revised from "Why hadn't they already killed him?", to exclude the contraction "hadn't". Though, there may be some argument here for "simple past" versus "present perfect" tenses
    – samuelesque
    Apr 23, 2013 at 21:21
  • Isn't it an argument for 'simple past' versus 'past perfect' tenses?
    – Yoichi Oishi
    Apr 24, 2013 at 20:53
  • Right you are. Yesterday I experienced an unfortunate coffee drought.
    – samuelesque
    Apr 24, 2013 at 22:18
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    @ Yoichi: It's important to note that the reporter specifically and deliberately used the word "already". Idiomatically, Simple Past doesn't work very well with "already", but Past Perfect does. Which probably accounts for GB having only 8 hits for why did they not already (simple past, do-support for "infinitive"), but 551 for why had they not already past perfect, have-support for past participle)
    – FumbleFingers
    Apr 24, 2013 at 23:52
  • @dotsamuelswan. What does 'experience an unfortunate coffee drought' mean just for my curiosity? Is it something like a hangover?
    – Yoichi Oishi
    Apr 25, 2013 at 23:54

1 Answer 1

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The article uses Past Perfect because the "narrative time" at that point is focussed on

...the carjacking victim “managed to escape”...

...in the preceding paragraph. That's to say, the reporter is asking why the Tsarnaevs hadn't already killed the victim, at some earlier time before he escaped.

I note OP's suggestion includes the word "then". But note that the reporter isn't asking why they didn't kill him when or after he "started escaping". He's specifically asking why they didn't do this some time after getting the ATM pin number and car, but before letting him get free.

Using Simple Past is perfectly valid, but doesn't convey the narrative sequence quite so precisely.

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