On July 3, Samuel Woodward, 26, was found guilty of murder with a hate-crime enhancement for the 2018 stabbing death of gay University of Pennsylvania student Blaze Bernstein.
According to CNN, Bernstein was a 19-year-old gay Jewish college sophomore who was home visiting his family in Southern California on winter break when he went missing. Authorities found his body a week later in a shallow grave at a nearby park.
Woodward and Bernstein previously attended the same California high school and connected via a dating app in the months before the attack, according to testimony at trial. During the trial, Woodward claimed that Bernstein groped him while Woodward was high on cannabis, taking pictures of his genitals and saying, “I got you,” repeatedly while also using the word “outed,” according to LGBTQ Nation. Previously, Woodward said the two had gone to meet in the park, after which Bernstein walked off to meet someone else, coming back to try and kiss Woodward before he murdered him, stabbing him more than 20 times.
Also, Ken Morrison, Woodward’s attorney, told jurors that his client faced challenges in his personal relationships due to a long-undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder and that Woodward was confused about his sexuality after growing up in a devoutly Catholic family with a father who espoused anti-LGBTQ+ views.
Bernstein’s family said in a statement no verdict could “erase the pain of losing our son and the agony of waiting all of these years without resolution,” ABC News reported.
Woodward could get up to life in prison without the possibility of parole when he is sentenced, according to NBC Los Angeles.
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