Samuel Woodward was motivated by hatred and intent to murder when he stabbed a gay former schoolmate 28 times in a dark park in 2018, an Orange County jury concluded Wednesday.
The jury deliberated for about a day before finding Woodward, 26, guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Blaze Bernstein, a 19-year-old University of Pennsylvania student.
The jury rejected the defense's claim that Woodward committed the stabbing only because Bernstein provoked him.
“We are thrilled with the verdict, which holds Samuel Woodward accountable,” Bernstein’s mother, Jeanne Pepper, said at a news conference. “It is a huge relief that justice will be served and that this despicable human being who murdered our son is no longer a threat to the public.”
The jury also convicted Woodward of an aggravated hate crime, which applied only to Bernstein's sexual orientation, even though he was Jewish and gay.
Woodward's computer was filled with anti-gay and anti-Jewish propaganda from the extremist group Atomwaffen Division, and he kept a “hate journal” in which he boasted about playing pranks on and scaring gay men.
Woodward faces a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole when Judge Kimberly Menninger sentences him on Oct. 25.
Technically, it is within the judge's discretion to depart from that sentence, but it is “politically impossible,” said Woodward's attorney, Deputy Public Defender Ken Morrison.
“That will not happen in this case, with this judge, especially with the prosecution and the media narrative over the last six years,” Morrison said.
Morrison has criticized that narrative as “a Nazi kills a gay Jew,” and spent much of the three-month trial trying to dismantle it, with limited success. He said Woodward would appeal, adding that there was “a very strong track record of appellate issues” related to evidence the jury was not allowed to see. He did not elaborate on that evidence.
Both sides portrayed Woodward as a young man struggling with his sexuality while growing up in a conservative Newport Beach family, with a particularly disapproving father.
Deputy District Attorney Jennifer Walker told jurors that when Woodward decided to kill Bernstein in January 2018, he chose a weapon with symbolic meaning: a knife with his father's name engraved on it.
“Who better than this homophobic father to prove that you’re not gay?” Walker said during closing arguments. “I’m not gay, look what I just did.”
Morrison acknowledged his client was guilty of killing Bernstein, which he called a “heinous crime,” but said it was voluntary manslaughter, not murder.
“There was no premeditation or deliberation,” he told jurors, arguing the killing had no connection to his client's interest in the Atomwaffen Division.
On the night of the murder, Bernstein and Woodward exchanged flirtatious text messages. They had met by chance years earlier at the Orange County School of the Arts, where Woodward had a reputation for his far-right and anti-gay views.
Woodward had dropped out of college and was living with his parents. Bernstein, an out gay student, was staying with his parents during winter break in Lake Forest.
Woodward suggested he was bisexually curious. Bernstein texted him his address. Woodward picked him up and they went to a nearby park.
“Unfortunately for Blaze, curiosity got the better of him,” Walker said.
As he took the stand to defend himself, Woodward appeared almost catatonic, his words halting and slow, his eyes downcast, his face covered by a curtain of disheveled hair. His lawyer had to constantly remind him to look up.
Woodward testified that he took two puffs of a strong marijuana joint, became groggy and emerged to find Bernstein touching his genitals.
According to Woodward's account, Bernstein told him he had been caught, called him a hypocrite and said something to the effect of “I got you.” Woodward said he feared Bernstein had taken a photo of his genitals and was texting it to someone.
When asked for details about the stabbing, Woodward repeatedly said he could not remember.
Bernstein's blood was found on the knife bearing Woodward's father's name, leading prosecutors to conclude that it was the murder weapon. But Woodward insisted he had used a different knife.
No evidence emerged that Bernstein took explicit photographs of Woodward, and Walker, the prosecutor, called the defendant's account “ridiculous” and “revisionist history.”
Scoffing at the idea that Woodward flew into a rage out of fear of being found out, she said he had posted his own photo on a Tinder profile saying he was looking for other men and had sent photos of his penis more than once.
She said “taking a gun with your father’s name on it is very symbolic,” particularly since Woodward, a Boy Scout, owned several knives. The prosecutor said that by killing Bernstein, Woodward hoped to raise his profile in the Atomwaffen Division.
“He'll prove to Atomwaffen that he's not gay,” Walker said. “He'll prove to his father that he's not gay. He'll prove to himself that he's not gay.”
When police searched Woodward's belongings, they found a skull mask (an emblem of the Atomwaffen) spattered with Bernstein's blood, indicating that Woodward had it with him during the stabbing.
“Why are you wearing a skull mask?” Walker asked. “This is a ceremonial kill that will bring him prestige and admiration, and it did. We heard Atomwaffen was proud of him for it.”
Woodward buried Bernstein in a shallow grave in the park and, to distract investigators, sent text messages to Bernstein's phone asking where he was. Woodward's initial account to police was that he had accompanied Bernstein to the park, but that Bernstein had inexplicably wandered off.
After a week of searching, Bernstein's body was found when rain washed away the dirt covering it. No shovel was found. However, dirt was discovered under Woodward's fingernails and, according to Morrison, he had dug the makeshift grave with his hands, proving that it was not a premeditated crime.
Morrison portrayed his client as a socially awkward young man who suffered for years from undiagnosed autism.
He said there was no evidence that Woodward had actually made jokes and terrorized gay men beyond the account in his “hate diary,” which Morrison characterized as empty boasting.
Morrison denied that Bernstein's fatal stabbing was “a hate crime inspired by the likes of Hitler and [Charles] “Manson.”
He attributed his client’s connection to Atomwaffen Division to “his lifelong struggle to fit in, make and maintain meaningful friendships,” which left him vulnerable to a group that offered camaraderie and preyed on people like him. He said his client had a “hunger for human connection.”
The Santa Ana courtroom was packed Wednesday afternoon. After the jury filed in, the verdict was delivered to the judge and then to the court clerk, Anthony Villa, an 18-year veteran of the courtroom who has read more than 100 verdicts aloud without showing emotion.
This time, her voice cracked when she said “guilty,” and she struggled for a moment to continue.
The emotion echoed among Bernstein's friends and family, who sat together. “Thank God,” one sobbed.
