commentary by patrick H. Moore
Tuesday, April 29th, would appear to be an important day in American jurisprudence. This is the day a six-man, six-woman jury of his peers found Byron Smith of Little Falls, Minnesota guilty of the premeditated first-degree murder of two formerly All-American type teenagers, 18-year-old Haile Kifer and 17-year-old Nick Brady. I say formerly All-American because at least one of the teens appears to have been using prescription pain pills which were found by investigators in a vehicle associated with the two kids. It seems incontrovertible that the two teens broke into Smith’s house with the intention of robbing it. It also seems incontrovertible that Smith had decided to kill the kids as opposed to turning them in to the police, which he could have easily done with the help of his firearms.
Sasha Goldstein of the New York Daily News writes:
A Minnesota man who gunned down two teens who broke into his home was found guilty of murdering the unarmed intruders he likened to “vermin.”
A jury took just three hours Tuesday afternoon to find Byron Smith, 65, guilty of the Thanksgiving Day 2012 slayings of Haile Kifer, 18, and Nick Brady, 17. Audio clips of the shootings were captured by a recording system the man had rigged up to capture the burglars in the act.
Little Falls, where the trial occurred and the jury deliberated, is a small town of slightly over 8,000 people situated 100 miles northwest of Minneapolis along the Mississippi River.
In his closing arguments on Tuesday, prosecutor Pete Orput likened the killings to deer hunting from a tree stand as he methodically outlined the preparations the former government employee took before slaying the teens. Smith stocked up on water, snacks, extra ammo, a book and a tarp in his basement. He also deposited his truck some distance from his home to make it appear that he was not there.
Orput showed the courtroom a picture of the chair where Smith waited, stating, “That’s the deer stand, right there.”
Oddly, Smith incriminated himself to some degree. Audio recordings of the twin killings were found on his recording equipment in his bugged basement. The 15-minute clip of the shooting includes the sounds of Nicky and Haily being gunned down and of Smith dragging their bodies in a tarp to keep their blood from staining his carpet.
What a fastidious fellow!
The prosecutors were able to demonstrate quite effectively that Smith clearly enjoyed slaughtering the teens. After all, on the tape he can be heard toying with his victims, saying, “You’re dead,” after firing a fatal shot into one wounded victim.
It is no stretch to say that the recordings clearly harmed Smith’s chances of being acquitted. The fact that he didn’t tell a neighbor about the incident until the next day, claiming that he didn’t want to ruin anyone’s Thanksgiving also did not help his case. The three hours the jury was out was probably just enough time for the gender-balanced jury to go over the evidence. I suspect there were no real holdouts amongst the jurors.
Smith was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole immediately after the verdict. Fortunately for him, as well as for the Minnesota state budget, life for him may mean another 10 to 20 years.
This verdict sets an excellent precedent sending the clear message that no matter how aggrieved they are for whatever wrongs they may have suffered, homeowners cannot lie in wait for the intruders and then merrily assassinate them. Hopefully, other angry old men (Smith is about a year older than I am) will get the message. It’s a shame when teens get rubbed out because they’re going through a rough stretch in which they do really dumb stuff like robbing people’s house to get money to buy narcotics. I mean, C’MON, can’t they come up with something a little more original?
Click here to view All Things Crime Blog’s previous Byron Smith trial post:
Minnesota Man Is on Trial for Lying in Wait and Killing Two Teenage Burglars