A California man who was convicted in the death of his former high school classmate in what authorities described as a hate-motivated murder was sentenced Friday to life in prison without the possibility of parole, prosecutors said.
The sentencing comes more than four months after Samuel Lincoln Woodward , 26, of Newport Beach, California, was convicted of first-degree murder along with a hate crime enhancement and personal use of a knife, according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office. Prosecutors said Woodward killed Blaze Bernstein, 19, after reconnecting with him on a dating app for men seeking men in 2018.
Bernstein — who was a gay, Jewish student at the University of Pennsylvania — was home from winter break visiting his parents when he disappeared on the night of Jan. 2, 2018, according to prosecutors. Authorities found his body a week later at a park in Lake Forest, California.
An investigation revealed that Bernstein had been stabbed 28 times before he was buried in a makeshift grave at the park, prosecutors said. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department arrested Woodward on Jan. 12, 2018, at his home in Newport Beach.