A homeless man named Shawn Laval Smith, 34, brutally murdered UCLA student Brianna Kupfer in 2022 by stabbing her 46 times and leaving her to bleed out, as revealed by prosecutors.
According to Los Angeles County district attorneys, Smith targeted Kupfer while she was alone at the boutique furniture store where she worked, using an audio recorder to document the attack and leaving behind a filet knife covered in Kupfer’s blood with his DNA on the handle.
Smith, with a history of criminal activities, was convicted of murder by the jury for attacking Kupfer with a knife after “lying in wait.”
LA County Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian characterized Smith as a sick individual akin to Hannibal Lecter, deriving pleasure from the idea of killing women.
Evidence presented in the trial showed that Smith had expressed his desire to harm women in recordings made a month prior to the attack, leading to his conviction of first-degree murder in Los Angeles.
“This man hated women,” Bailan said during his closing argument, according to NBC LA. “It’s easier probably to sleep at night to think something is wrong with him rather than face the truth that this man was on a crusade to hunt, to destroy and to kill for the mere fact that she was female.”
Defense attorney Robert Haberer argued that Smith’s actions were not premeditated and may have been a result of him venting his frustrations in the moment.
Kupfer was a graduate student studying architecture.
In his closing arguments, Bailan mentioned how Smith took advantage of Kupfer’s kindness and attacked her when she least expected it, leaving her injured on the floor.
Smith faces a life sentence in prison without the possibility of parole, pending a determination of his sanity at the time of the attack by a judge.
