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Even if the trial judge had been mistaken in excluding the evidence, Mr. Feigin said, the error was harmless given the overwhelming evidence that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was “a motivated terrorist who willingly maimed and murdered innocents, including an eight-year-old boy, in furtherance of jihad.”

Ginger D. Anders, a lawyer for Mr. Tsarnaev, disagreed. “The Waltham evidence would have changed the terms of the debate,” she said.

“The evidence’s exclusion distorted the penalty phase here by enabling the government to present a deeply misleading account of the key issues of influence and leadership,” she said.

Justice Kagan said the judge had allowed the jury to hear other evidence bearing on Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

“This court let in evidence about Tamerlan poking somebody in the chest,” she said. “This court let in evidence about Tamerlan shouting at people. This court let in evidence about Tamerlan assaulting a fellow student, all because that showed what kind of person Tamerlan was and what kind of influence he might have had over his brother.”

“And yet,” Justice Kagan said, “this court kept out evidence that Tamerlan led a crime that resulted in three murders?”

Justice Stephen G. Breyer seemed to agree that the evidence was important.

“This was their defense,” he said of Mr. Tsarnaev’s lawyers. “They had no other defense. They agreed he was guilty. Their only claim was, don’t give me the death penalty because it’s my brother who was the moving force.”