FILE - Samuel Woodward testifies in Orange County Superior Court, June 13, 2024, in Santa Ana, California (Leonard Orti/The Orange County Register via AP, Pool, File)
A California man convicted of stabbing to death a gay, Jewish University of Pennsylvania student in an act of hate is sentenced to life without parole in prison.
Samuel Woodward, 27, is sentenced in a Southern California courtroom at the end of an all-day hearing for the murder of Blaze Bernstein nearly seven years ago. Woodward, who did did not appear in court due to illness, was convicted this year of first-degree murder with an enhancement for a hate crime for killing Bernstein, a gay, Jewish college sophomore.
Dozens of Bernstein ‘s relatives and friends sat in the courtroom. Many wore T-shirts reading “Blaze it Forward,” a slogan for a campaign to commit acts of kindness in his name following his death.
“Let’s be clear: This was a hate crime,” Bernstein’s mother, Jeanne Pepper, tells the court. “Samuel Woodward ended my son’s life because my son was Jewish and gay.”
She says she takes solace in Woodward never getting out of custody and that while he “rots in prison, we will be here on the outside, celebrating the life of Blaze.”
The question during Woodward’s monthslong trial was not whether he killed Bernstein but why and the circumstances under which it happened.
Prosecutors said Woodward was affiliated with the violent anti-gay, neo-Nazi extremist group Atomwaffen Division, while Woodward’s lawyer said his client didn’t plan to kill anyone or hate Bernstein and faced challenging personal relationships due to a long-undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder.
Gideon Bernstein and Jeanne Pepper Bernstein, parents of Blaze Bernstein, speak during a press conference after Samuel Woodward was sentenced to life without parole at Orange County Superior Court on Nov. 15, 2024, in Santa Ana, California, for the fatal stabbing of his former classmate, Blaze Bernstein, in Jan. 2018. (Jeff Gritchen/The Orange County Register via AP, Pool)
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Sunday, November 17, 2024
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