MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Minnesota man has been sentenced to a 30-year prison term for killing a transgender woman last year in Minneapolis.
Damarean Bible, 25, was found guilty of second-degree murder in August and sentenced Wednesday, Minnesota Public Radio News reported. Bible admitted fatally shooting 38-year-old Savannah Ryan Williams on Nov. 29.
“She was my best friend and meant everything to me,” Williams’ mother, Kim Stillday, said at the sentencing hearing. “As a person, Savannah was funny. She would light up any room she walked into.”
Prosecutor James Hannemon called the shooting “a cold-blooded, brazen killing” that was unprovoked.
“She just had the great misfortune of coming across a person who valued her life so little,” he said.
Bible spoke briefly at the hearing.
“I completely apologize,” Bible said. “I feel like I do need to sit down and do some time.”
Bible told police he began to feel “suspicious” while engaged in a sex act with Williams and shot her in the head.
It was the second attack on a transgender woman near the same light-rail station in 2023. Two men pleaded guilty to severely beating a trans woman during a robbery in February 2023, although prosecutors concluded that attack was not motivated by bias. The local LGBTQ+ community was also roiled by a shooting at a mostly queer and trans punk rock show in August 2023 that left one person dead and six injured.