The double murder trial of a man accused of killing two Alaska Native women is set to begin more than four years after a woman turned in a stoled digital memory card that authorities say contained gruesome recordings of one of the killings.

Now, more than four years later, what she found on that card is key to a double murder trial set to begin this week: gruesome photos and videos of a woman being beaten and strangled at a Marriott hotel, her attacker speaking in a strong accent as he urged her to die, her blanket-covered body being snuck outside on a luggage cart.

“In my movies, everybody always dies,” the voice says on one video. "What are my followers going to think of me? People need to know when they are being serial-killed.”

About a week after she took the SD card, the woman turned it over to police, who said they recognized the voice as that of Brian Steven Smith, now 52, a South Africa native they knew from a prior investigation, court documents say.

  • Gork@lemm.ee
    19·
    10 months ago

    Alaska State Troopers in 2018 incorrectly identified another body as that of Abouchuk, because Abouchuk’s ID had been discovered with it, for reasons that remain unclear.

    Maybe that other body was another of his victims?

  • athos77@kbin.social
    15·
    10 months ago

    A woman with a lengthy criminal history including theft, assault and prostitution got into a truck with a man who had picked her up for a “date” near downtown Anchorage. When he left her alone in the vehicle, she stole a digital memory card from the center console.

    I’m glad she got away okay.

    • OceanSoap
      4·
      10 months ago

      And with that single theft and bringing it to police, she gained a shit ton of karma to make up for some of that other petty theft.