Brianna Kupfer's suspected killer is on trial for murder, two years after the 24-year-old UCLA student was brutally stabbed to death.
Kupfer, a graduate student in architecture, was working alone at Croft House, a boutique furniture store in Los Angeles' Hancock Park neighborhood, on Jan. 13, 2022, when suspect Sean LaValle Smith entered the store and allegedly stabbed her dozens of times.
“The evidence will demonstrate that the defendant swung the knife at Brianna with great force, with great determination, and very frequently and repeatedly, bending the steel blade,” Assistant District Attorney Habib Balian said in the prosecution's opening statement. “Brianna Kupfer was stabbed 26 times and died.”
Smith, who has a lengthy criminal history, was arrested six days after Kupfer's murder.
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Shawn LaValle Smith is on trial for the 2022 stabbing death of Brianna Kupfer. (KTTV)
“This was a brutal murder,” Nathan Hochman, a rival for Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón, told Fox News on Monday.
“According to the prosecution's opening statement, Shawn LaValle Smith was a drifter with a criminal history of over 10 years,” Hochman added. “Investigators found DNA on Smith's knife. There is video of him in the store, he actually made an audio recording and on that audio tape you can hear her begging him and saying that she could actually help him.”
“Her final words are to him: 'I can help you, I can help you, I can help you,' and he is telling her: 'It's over, damn it, it's over,'” Varian said in court.
He added: “The defendant recorded himself saying the most vile, disgusting and grotesque thoughts about women.”
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Brianna Kupfer, 24, was stabbed to death in 2022. (LinkedIn)
Hochman added, “Smith should never have been on the streets that day. He had a criminal record dating back 10 years and if the prosecutors at the time had done their job and arrested him on an outstanding warrant, he would never have been in the furniture store that day and killed Brianna Kupfer.”
According to FOX 11, prosecutors said Smith went to six other stores looking for a woman working alone before finding Kupfer.
“He wanted to kill women,” Varian said in court.
Kupfer's parents called her an “angel.” (Emma McIntyre/Getty Images)
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If convicted, Smith could face life in prison without the possibility of parole.
“The funny thing is, I'm sitting here thinking, 'What do I say about her?' I want to be authentic, I want to be true, but to say she was an angel and perfect doesn't sound like any of that is true,” Kupfer's father, Todd Kupfer, told FOX 11 last week ahead of the trial.
“That may not sound quite true, but it was pretty much true.”
