Man gets life in prison for killing UCLA student at furniture store
The 34-year-old man who killed a UCLA graduate student, stabbing her 46 times as she worked inside a Hancock Park boutique furniture store, was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Shawn Laval Smith was convicted Sept. 10 of first-degree murder for the killing of Brianna Kupfer, 24, a crime prosecutors say was motivated by a broader hatred for women.
After a brief hearing Wednesday morning that included reports from a pair of doctors, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mildred Escobedo determined that Smith was sane at the time of the Jan.13, 2022 crime, which was captured on a chilling audio recording. That determination cleared the judge to move ahead with the sentencing.
During his trial, prosecutors said Smith went "hunting for a woman alone" the day of the murder. After approaching women working at other businesses in the central Los Angeles neighborhood, he came across Kupfer, working alone.
Her body was found by a customer about 15 minutes after she sent a text to a friend, saying she got a "bad vibe" from someone in the store.
Smith was arrested in Pasadena one week after the murder.
In early September, a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder along with special allegations of murder while lying in wait and that he used a deadly and dangerous weapon, a knife, during the commission of the crime.
