At 1:30 in the afternoon, Briana Cuper sent her manager a text: “Can you call me? There’s a customer here, and I’m getting a weird feeling. ”
The manager didn’t see it right away. By the time she called back, Briana didn’t answer.
Neither did the store’s landline. A few minutes later, a couple walked into the furniture store. There was no one at the front. They stepped deeper inside and noticed something behind one of the sofas.
A person. Covered in blood. They ran out and called the police. Officers found 24-year-old Briana dead on the floor, her phone lying near her hand.
She had been stabbed dozens of times. The cash register was untouched. Nothing had been stolen. But sitting on the counter where she’d been working was a small voice recorder.
It was still running. Detectives pressed play. The recording began with the jingle of the front door bell, then Briana’s cheerful voice greeting a customer. A man said he and his girlfriend were looking for a new couch.
Briana offered to show him some models. He stepped outside to call his girlfriend, came back in, asked for her social media, and she politely declined. Then he asked if she followed Biden’s politics. “No,” Briana replied.
“I think this government’s gone crazy,” he muttered. “Put your phone down. ”
A few seconds later: “Relax. I’m not going to hurt you.
”
Detectives heard the sound of a blade being drawn. Briana’s voice shifted. She told him to leave, said she’d already called the police. He didn’t listen.
The recording captured the attack in chilling detail—her pleading, her offer to help him, her voice going silent. The attacker walked out. Minutes later, her phone started ringing. It was her manager calling back.
Then the audio caught the couple entering the store and discovering her body. The recorder held another recording, made months earlier by the same man, ranting about how much he hated women. Store surveillance caught the suspect approaching Briana’s counter, but he was hidden behind a hood, sunglasses, and a medical mask. Outdoor cameras showed him walking away after the murder.
Investigators found a bloody shoe print on a couch, left when Briana had tried to run and he’d leapt over it to cut her off. They recovered the murder weapon—a seven-inch blade bent from the force of the stabbing. The coroner’s report confirmed Briana had been stabbed 46 times. Detectives learned the man had walked into six other businesses on that street before entering Briana’s store, leaving each one almost immediately.
At the chiropractic clinic next door, he asked a few questions about their services and left. Piecing it together, investigators realized he’d been hunting for a woman who was alone. Everywhere else had other staff or customers. Briana’s store had only her.
News of the murder spread across Los Angeles, igniting fury. People were already angry about rising crime in the city, and many blamed policies like zero-bail releases and shortened early-parole requirements. There was outrage over the fact that Briana had been left to work alone in the store, making her an easy target. Police released photos of the suspect and announced a $250,000 reward, most of it from the store where Briana worked.
Hundreds of tips came in. None led anywhere. Then the lab results came back. DNA on the murder weapon matched a 31-year-old man named Shawn Smith.
He had no fixed address. His criminal record painted a grim picture: drug possession, theft, trespassing, attacking a police officer and biting his finger, and firing a flare gun into a car with a child inside. Not long before the murder, he’d been released early from a short prison sentence, violated the terms, and vanished. The public’s anger only grew when they learned how many chances he’d been given.
Six days after the murder, a man driving through the city called police. He’d spotted someone who looked exactly like the suspect. He circled the block, drove past again, and noticed the same backpack from the surveillance footage. Officers rushed over and found the man.
He matched Shawn’s description but gave a different name. A portable fingerprint scanner confirmed it was him within minutes. Shawn was taken into custody but wouldn’t admit anything. Prosecutors announced they would pursue the harshest sentence available, but the district attorney publicly opposed the death penalty, calling it ineffective and racially biased.
Months later, a psychiatric evaluation found Shawn fully aware of his actions. He then demanded to represent himself in court. At his very first hearing, he insulted the judge. The court revoked his right to self-representation and assigned him a public defender.
He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, despite the evidence saying otherwise. The trial began in late August 2024, more than two years after the murder. The prosecution had surveillance footage, fingerprints, and DNA. The defense called no witnesses and presented no evidence.
The attorney argued the attack was spontaneous, not premeditated, even though Shawn had walked into six other businesses looking for a victim. He also tried to play on the jury’s emotions, claiming the case only got media attention because Briana was white and Shawn was Black. The court played the recording of Briana’s final moments. Before it began, the judge allowed her family to step outside so they wouldn’t have to relive the horror.
Afterward, the judge ordered that the recording never be released to the public. The jury also heard other recordings where Shawn spoke openly about his hatred toward women. The jury spent barely an hour deliberating before returning a verdict of guilty. At sentencing, psychiatrists evaluated Shawn again.
All concluded there were no serious mental conditions that could excuse his actions. Then the judge played recordings taken from the jail. In three separate phone calls, Shawn told friends and relatives that all he had to do was act crazy, and instead of prison, he’d be sent to a hospital for five years and then walk free. He spoke with complete confidence, apparently forgetting every call was recorded.
Shawn was ruled mentally competent and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Under California law, even those sentenced to life without parole can technically apply for parole later. The judge said he hoped every future petition would be denied given the brutality of the crime. No clear motive ever emerged.
Based on his own recordings, Shawn simply harbored a deep hatred for women and wanted to hurt them. The fact that he walked into six other businesses before attacking Briana showed one chilling thing: he didn’t care who it was, as long as it was a woman. In Briana’s memory, hundreds of people gathered outside the store where she was killed. They built a memorial filled with flowers, her photos, and signs demanding action.
But despite the outrage and the calls for change, nothing meaningful has been done. In California, the same lenient treatment of offenders remains, even in the face of cases like this one.
