ANCHORAGE, Alaska –
The punishment of 226 years in prison was handed down on Friday to a guy who killed two Alaska Native women and was overheard saying on camera that “everybody always dies” in his films.
Veronica Abouchuk, 52, was reported missing by her family in February 2019, seven months after they had last seen her, and Kathleen Henry, 30, both received 99-year terms for their deaths from Brian Steven Smith.
The punishment was imposed by Alaska Superior Court Judge Kevin Saxby, who stated, “Both were treated about as horribly as a person can be treated.”
That’s what nightmares are made of, according to Saxby.
Other counts, such as sexual assault and evidence tampering, carried the remaining 28 years in prison. The death penalty is not applied in Alaska.
Before torturing and killing Henry at a motel in Anchorage in September 2019, Smith, a South African native who had recently become a naturalized citizen of the United States, exhibited little emotion at the sentencing hearing.
Image – The Mirror US
The jury convicted him guilty in February following a three-week trial, and he showed no emotion during the proceedings, which lasted less than two hours.
The victims were given simply initials during the trial instead of names. Saxby stated that their names would be utilized to reclaim their identities during the punishment process.
SEE MORE –
Finally Arrested! Breakthrough in 2019 Murder Case: Suspect Arrested in 16-Year-Old’s Killing
Following the theft of Smith’s iPhone from his truck in 2019, wherein the graphic footage of Henry’s torture and murder was discovered, Smith was placed under arrest. She eventually transferred the photos to a memory card and gave it to the authorities.
When Abouchuk’s body was discovered earlier but was misdiagnosed, Smith later admitted to killing both Henry and Abouchuk.
Homeless while residing in Anchorage, both Alaska Native women were from small settlements in western Alaska.
The person whose death was reported at the TownePlace Suites by Marriott in midtown Anchorage has been named by the authorities as Henry. During September 2-4, 2019, Smith, a hotel employee, was scheduled to stay there. Initial photos from the card, timestamped at approximately one in the morning on September 4, featured Henry’s corpse, according to authorities.
In the final photo, which was taken early on September 6, Henry’s body was seen in the rear of a black pickup. Smith’s phone was located in the same remote area south of Anchorage, according to charging documents, where Henry’s body was discovered a few weeks later.
Although they were not shown to the public, the jury saw videos from the memory card during the trial. Despite not having his face visible in the films, Smith’s unique South African accent could be heard narrating as if there was an audience, a feature that the police finally recognized from prior interactions. He pounded and strangled Henry while continuously urging her to die on the recording.
One video has a voiceover that states, “Everyone always dies in my movies.” “How will I be perceived by my subscribers? When someone is being serially murdered, they should be aware of it.
After his wife left town, Smith picked up Abouchuk in Anchorage, and during the eight-hour police questioning captured on camera, he admitted to killing her. There was an odor when he urged her to take a shower after they got to his house, but she declined.
She was shot in the head, according to Smith, who then got enraged and dumped her body north of Anchorage after taking a weapon from the garage. He provided the police with the location, and they subsequently discovered a skull that had been shot.