Samuel Woodward, 27, from California, was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole last weekend for stabbing Jewish student Blaze Bernstein to death in 2018.
Dozens of Bernstein’s family and friends filled the courtroom in California. "Let’s be clear, this was a hate crime," the victim's mother, Jeanne Pepper, said in court. "Samuel Woodward ended my son’s life because my son was Jewish and gay.”
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הרוצח סם וודוורד בבית המשפט
(צילום: Frederick M. Brown/Pool Photo via Orange County Register, via AP)
According to the Associated Press, the trial, which lasted several months, centered not on whether Woodward murdered Bernstein but on the circumstances of the crime. Prosecutors argued that Woodward was affiliated with a violent neo-Nazi extremist group.
Woodward’s defense attorney countered, claiming his client didn’t plan to kill anyone or harbor hate toward Bernstein, and that he struggled with "challenging personal relationships due to a long-undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder.”
Woodward was arrested on January 15, 2018, and charged with murdering Blaze Bernstein, a former student at the Orange County School of the Arts. Bernstein, who had been missing for a week, was found in a shallow grave. A post-mortem examination revealed he had been stabbed 19 times.
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Blaze Bernstein's parents talk to the media next to a photo of their son
(Photo: Mark Rightmire/The Orange County Register via AP)
Five days before Woodward’s arrest, he and Bernstein met at Borrego Park in Lake Forest, Orange County, according to the Orange County Sheriff's Office. Bernstein, a University of Pennsylvania student, was home for winter break and had reconnected with his former high school classmate.
In 2018, investigators searched Woodward's computer and found that he lauded the Confederate flag, claiming it represented Southern pride rather than hate. In one of the chat groups he frequented, he was asked, "What two things would you take to a deserted island?" Woodward replied, "The Bible and a Colt .45."
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