A homeless man convicted in the fatal stabbing of a 24-year-old UCLA graduate student in a Hancock Park furniture store was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Shawn Laval Smith, 34, was convicted Sept. 10 of first-degree murder for the Jan. 13, 2022, killing of Brianna Kupfer, 24. Investigators said Kupfer was stabbed 46 times in the brutal attack when she was working alone inside the Croft House in the 300 block of North La Brea Avenue, near Beverly Boulevard.
After a brief hearing Wednesday morning that included a review or reports from a pair of doctors, a judge determined that Smith was sane at the time of the crime, which was captured on an audio recording. The judge's decision allowed the case to move ahead to the sentencing phase.
Get top local stories in Southern California delivered to you every morning. Sign up for NBC LA's News Headlines newsletter.
In addition to convicting him of murder, jurors in the trial also found true a special circumstance allegation of murder while lying in wait, along with an allegation that the defendant used a knife during the commission of the crime. Smith had pleaded both not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity, necessitating the sanity phase of the case, for which the defendant waived a jury trial, allowing Escobedo along to determine if he was sane at the time.
Family members and friends of Kupfer spoke in court, sharing their thoughts and emotions in victim impact statements.
Kupfer's father, Todd, described his daughter's attacker as "beyond evil." There isn't a day that he doesn't think about his daughter, he said.
The victim's mother, Lori Kupfer, described her daughter as a "beautiful person inside and out" who was trying to make the world a better place. She said the family will never hear her daughter's laughter or have her on hand for more holiday gatherings.
"Forty-six stab wounds took that away," Lori Kupfer said, adding that the defendant showed no remorse during the trial.
One of the Kupfer's brothers, Brandon, also spoke, saying the family is heartbroken over a loved one "taken from us far too soon." Sister Mikaela describe Brianna as her best friend and her biggest support system.
During the trial, prosecutors described the defendant as a man who hates women and sought to hunt a victim. They said he went from business to business in the area looking for a woman working alone, then posed as a customer.
"Her guard was down," Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian said of the encounter with Kupfer. "He was lying in wait for his perfect target. She had no idea what he plans to do to her."
A digital audio recorder left at the scene was still recording when police responded to the Croft store. The attacker can be heard telling Kupfer that he does not intend to hurt her.
"Just get down on the floor," a voice can be heard telling Kupfer.
The recording then captured screams and the attacker's voice saying, "It's over, it's over, it's over, it's over, b----."
Kupfer was left bleeding on the floor and died at the scene. Her body was found by a woman who entered the store, then hurried outside to call 911.
The attacker left through a back door to the business and walked down an alley before disappearing between two apartment buildings, prosecutors said. leaving behind a knife and the audio recorder. The device included a recording made weeks earlier on which Smith could be heard saying, "I do not like b------," and vowing to "destroy everything."
Defense attorney Robert Haberer countered that the recording from December 2021 did not prove there was a motive to commit murder by the man he described as a "homeless drifter" roaming at commercial businesses to talk with people behind the counter. Smith's lawyer called the recording a "mildly incoherent rant laced with profanities" and "not exactly some sort of manifesto" or "smoking gun."
"The fact that he was upset about women is not a red flag," Haberer told jurors about the older recording, describing it as "blowing off steam."
Smith's attorney claimed the decision to attack Kupfer happened in an instant.
"This was not planned in any way," he said.
Smith was arrested six days after the attack when a Pasadena resident called police to report a sighting of the defendant following an offer of a reward, according to the prosecutor.
