Firsthand Perspectives from the Sam Woodward Trial: A Conversation with Louis Keene

On July 3rd, 2024, a Orange County, California jury found Sam Woordward guilty of first degree murder with a hate crime enhancement for the 2018 killing of Blaze Bernstein. On July 25 at 1 PM ET, the Program on Extremism hosted reporter Louis Keene to discuss his coverage of the nearly three-month trial of Woodward—a member of the neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division who was accused by prosecutors of luring Bernstein to a park in order to commit an act of hateful violence in the name of the group. In a discussion hosted by Program on Extremism research fellow Jon Lewis, the panelists discussed Keene’s firsthand perspectives from inside the courtroom and detail key findings from the trial.

On July 25, 2024, the Program on Extremism (PoE) at the George Washington University hosted an event titled “Firsthand Perspectives from the Sam Woodward Trial: A Conversation with Louis Keene.” Journalist Louis Keene, a reporter for the Forward covering LGBTQ+ and Jewish issues, joined PoE Research Fellow Jon Lewis to discuss the Sam Woodward trial, the threat of the Atomwaffen division, and how intersectionality plays a role in the American justice system.

On January 2, 2018, Sam Woodward met former classmate Blaze Bernstein after matching on Tinder. Sentence here saying what happened - brief overview of the murder. The events that followed became the centerpiece ofWoodward’s trial six years later, although Woodward’s role as Bernstein’s killer remained uncontested. Woodward’s defense attempted to illustrate that the murder was neither premeditated, nor a result of Woodward’s homophobic and anti-semitic beliefs, despite his known affiliation with the neo-Nazi group, the Atomwaffen Division. Louis Keene attended the trial as a reporter, and offers a first-hand perspective of the trial.

The prosecution and the defense created two vastly different stories from the same pool of evidence. While the prosecution’s narrative was straightforward and rooted in the evidence, the defense’s portrayal of events was based on Woodward’s account of the night, with far less tangible evidence to support it. The defense relied completely onWoodward’s testimony as the focal pointe of their case. Keene described Woodward’s testimony as strange and disturbing, and compared Woodward’s behavior/appearance/mannerisms/ on the stand to Charles Manson, a celebrated figure amongst Atomwaffen circles. While the defense attempted to spin Woodward’s poor presentation as evidence of his mental decline that followed in the years after the attack, Keene suggested that Woodward’s unusual, impersonable character was a detriment to the defense, and contributed to the jury ultimately siding with the prosecution.

On the other hand, Keene noted that both Bernstein and Woodward’s parents gave reliable testimonies. The Bernstein testimonies were heavy and difficult to listen to, as they described the hours that followed the realization that their son was missing. Woodward’s parents offered insight into their son’s childhood and homelife, and attempted to walk the line between protecting the family’s reputation and giving their son a chance at freedom one day. Both sets of parents delivered truthful, painful testimonies that strongly contributed to both the prosecution and the defense’s cases.

Keene made it clear that Woodward did not seem remorseful for his crime nor his affiliation with a Neo-nazi group. The closest the defendant came to demonstrating remorse during the trial was when his attorney asked whether Bernstein deserved to die, to which Woodward responded“No.” However, Woodward reportedly continued to engage in satanic chanting while in prison, and has seemingly not renounced the belief systems that led him to murder Bernstein on January 2, 2018.

Need some kind of transition word or lede in here connecting this paragraph with one above. Additionally/etc. something similar, two former members of the Atomwaffen division testified at Woodward’s trial; one for the prosecution and one for the defense. Each portrayed vastly different accounts of the threat posed by Atomwaffen, with one witness saying that the group was mostly harmless, while the other, testifying anonymously, said that the group posed a legitimate threat to the United States, despite the organization never having more than 80 members nationwide.. In the weeks following the murder, Woodward was celebrated by other Atomwaffen members , although it is unclear whether his attack will have a lasting legacy within the Atomwaffen division.

Toward the end of the discussion, Keene explained that Sam Woodward’s story was an American one, colored by multi-generational trauma, concern regarding familial reputation, and loneliness, all of which contributed to the circumstances that led Woodward to pack his car with his Atomwaffen mask and knife that night. During the trial, it was revealed that Woodward’s father was molested as a child, which served as the foundation for his homophobia and the hatred of the LGBTQ+ community he instilled in his sons. Additionally, while it is likely that Woodward himself was autistic, his family was reluctant to seek a diagnosis or access to support and resources, due to their fear of how Woodward’s autism would affect the family’s reputation. Furthermore, Woodward lived a lonely life, struggling to make friends, which also contributed to his d joining of the Atomwaffen division in search of male bonding. Unfortunately, the circumstances that led to Woodward’s radicalization are not unique and are shared by many other Americans, creating the conditions for additional radicalizations.