An Orange County jury convicted Samuel Woodward of first-degree homicide Wednesday within the stabbing demise of his homosexual highschool classmate.
Through the three-month trial, each side portrayed the 26-year-old Woodward as a younger man who struggled along with his sexuality rising up in a conservative Newport Seashore household, with a very disapproving father.
Deputy Dist. Atty. Jennifer Walker informed the jury that when Woodward determined to kill Blaze Bernstein, his former classmate, in January 2018, he selected a weapon with symbolic significance: a knife along with his father’s title etched on it.
“Who higher to show to that you simply’re not homosexual than this homophobic father?” Walker mentioned throughout closing arguments. “‘I’m not homosexual, look what I simply did.’”
Jurors started deliberating Woodward’s destiny Tuesday afternoon and got here again with their verdict a day later. Additionally they convicted Woodward of a hate-crime enhancement, which utilized to solely to Bernstein’s sexual orientation, although he was each Jewish and homosexual.
Woodward faces life with out the potential for parole, with a sentencing listening to scheduled for Oct. 25.
Woodward’s legal professional, Assistant Public Defender Ken Morrison, acknowledged that his consumer was responsible of stabbing Bernstein 28 occasions in a Lake Forest park, which he referred to as a “hideous crime,” however mentioned it was voluntary manslaughter, not homicide.
“There’s no premeditation or deliberation,” he informed jurors, arguing that Bernstein had provoked Woodward. He mentioned the killing had no connection to his consumer’s curiosity within the Atomwaffen Division, an extremist group whose anti-gay, anti-Jewish propaganda was discovered on Woodward’s pc.
On the night time of the killing, Bernstein and Woodward exchanged flirtatious textual content messages. That they had recognized one another casually years earlier on the Orange County College of the Arts, the place Woodward had a fame based mostly on his far-right, anti-gay views.
Woodward, who saved a “hate diary” wherein he bragged of pranking and scary homosexual males, had dropped out of school and was residing along with his mother and father. Bernstein, an out homosexual scholar on the College of Pennsylvania, was staying along with his mother and father over winter break in Lake Forest.
Woodward urged he was bi-curious. Bernstein texted his deal with. Woodward picked him up, and so they went to a close-by park.
“Sadly for Blaze, curiosity killed him,” Walker mentioned.
Taking the stand in his personal protection, Woodward appeared practically catatonic, his phrases halting and sluggish, his eyes solid downward, his face coated by a curtain of unkempt hair. His legal professional needed to preserve reminding him to lookup.
Woodward testified that he took two puffs on a powerful marijuana joint, went right into a haze and got here out of it to seek out Bernstein touching his genitals.
By Woodward’s account, Bernstein informed him he had been outed, referred to as him a hypocrite and mentioned one thing like, “I bought you.” Woodward mentioned he feared that Bernstein had taken a photograph of his genitals and was texting it to somebody.
Requested for particulars concerning the stabbing, Woodward repeatedly mentioned he couldn’t keep in mind.
Bernstein’s blood was discovered on the knife bearing Woodward’s father’s title, main prosecutors to conclude it was the homicide weapon. However Woodward insisted he had used a special knife.
No proof surfaced that Bernstein took specific pictures of Woodward, and Walker, the prosecutor, referred to as the defendant’s account “ridiculous” and “revisionist historical past.”
Deriding the notion that Woodward flew right into a rage for worry of being outed, she mentioned he had posted his personal photograph on a Tinder profile saying he was searching for different males and had despatched out pictures of his penis greater than as soon as.
She mentioned that “taking a weapon along with your dad’s title could be very symbolic,” notably since Woodward, an Eagle Scout, had a number of knives. The prosecutor mentioned that by killing Bernstein, Woodward hoped to lift his profile with the Atomwaffen Division.
“It would show to Atomwaffen he’s not homosexual,” Walker mentioned. “It would show to his dad he’s not homosexual. It would show to himself he’s not homosexual.”
When police searched Woodward’s belongings, they discovered a demise’s-head masks — an emblem of the Atomwaffen — spattered with Bernstein’s blood, indicating Woodward had it with him throughout the stabbing.
“Why are you bringing a cranium masks?” Walker mentioned. “It is a ceremonial killing for him that’s going to get him status and admiration, which it did. We heard Atomwaffen was pleased with him for this.”
Woodward buried Bernstein in a shallow grave within the park, and, to divert investigators, despatched texts to Bernstein’s cellphone asking the place he was. Woodward’s preliminary account to police was that he had accompanied Bernstein to the park however that Bernstein had inexplicably wandered off.
After a weeklong search, Bernstein’s physique was discovered when the rain washed away grime concealing his physique. No shovel was discovered. Dust was found underneath Woodward’s fingernails, nevertheless, and Morrison mentioned he had dug the makeshift grave along with his arms, an argument that it was not a premeditated crime.
Morrison portrayed his consumer as a socially awkward younger man who suffered for years with undiagnosed autism.
He mentioned there was no proof that Woodward had really pranked and terrorized homosexual males past the account in his “hate diary,” which Morrison characterised as empty boasting.
Morrison denied that Bernstein’s deadly stabbing was “a hate-fueled crime impressed by the likes of Hitler and [Charles] Manson.”
He attributed his consumer’s attachment to the Atomwaffen Division to “his lifelong wrestle to slot in, to make and keep significant friendships,” which left him weak to a gaggle that supplied fellowship and preyed on folks like him. He mentioned his consumer had a “hunger for human connection.”
