California Man to Face Trial for Stabbing Death Deemed a Hate Crime
Santa Ana, California: The Southern California man accused of stabbing University of Pennsylvania student Blaze Bernstein to death in a hate crime is scheduled to go on trial more than six years after the student’s murder.
Tuesday is set aside for opening statements in the murder trial of Samuel Woodward, a 26-year-old resident of Newport Beach, California. He entered a not-guilty plea.
Woodward is accused of killing Bernstein with a knife. During his winter break, the 19-year-old gay Jewish college sophomore was spending time with his family at home. The two young men had gone to the same Orange County high school in the past.
In January 2018, Bernstein vanished from sight after going to a park in Lake Forest, California, with Woodward. After Bernstein missed a dentist appointment and stopped answering calls or texts, his parents discovered his glasses, wallet, and credit cards in his bedroom the next day, according to a trial brief from the prosecution.
Bernstein’s body was discovered buried in a shallow grave at the park a few days later.
After getting to know Bernstein on Snapchat, Woodward picked him up from his parent’s house and stabbed him almost 20 times in the face and neck, according to the police.
Authorities claimed that Woodward’s iPhone had a wealth of hate group, anti-gay, and anti-Semitic materials and that DNA evidence connected him to the murder.
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According to the prosecution’ brief, a year prior, Woodward attempted to join the white supremacist neo-Nazi organization Atomwaffen Division. The brief stated that he kept journals, one of which was labeled “diary of hate” and contained threats he claimed to have made against gay persons on the internet.
Authorities stated that a folding knife with a bloodied blade was discovered in Woodward’s room at his parents’ posh Newport Beach home. In two days, Woodward was taken into custody.
Woodward entered a not-guilty plea to a charge of murder with a hate crime enhancement.
The Orange County Register stated that Woodward told detectives he got upset when Bernstein kissed him the night he vanished. This was at the time of his arrest.
His mother, Jeanne Bernstein, informed CBS News that he passed away in an extremely terrible manner. “Imagining a world without Blaze is heartbreaking for us,” stated Jeanne Bernstein.
Trial proceedings in the case were delayed several years due to concerns raised regarding Woodward’s mental health and several defense lawyer changes. In late 2022, Woodward was found to be competent to stand trial.
According to one of Woodward’s former attorneys, his client battled with his own sexuality and had Asperger’s syndrome, a developmental disability that typically results in trouble interacting with others.
Woodward’s lawyer, Ken Morrison, asked the public to refrain from drawing hasty judgments about the case.
“For the past six years, the public has been reading and hearing a prosecution and muckraking narrative about this case that is simply fundamentally wrong,” Morrison wrote in a message to the editor. “I caution everyone to respect our judicial process and wait until a jury has been able to see, hear, and evaluate all of the evidence.”
Before the trial, the district attorney’s office for Orange County declined to comment on the matter.