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Ambushed on the Prowl — The Case of Byron David Smith
Reasonable force or a tale of revenge?
Byron David Smith was tired of his house being burglarized. A former security engineering officer from the U.S. State Department, he had the perfect plan for dealing with the teenagers who ventured into the apparently empty home on Thanksgiving Day in 2012. Lying in wait on a basement chair in complete silence, he watched as unarmed Nicholas Brady, 17, and Haile Kifer, 18, entered separately from each other, ten minutes apart.
Bullets tore through the cousins and ended their lives not instantly, but from repeated shots, Smith taking great satisfaction in his alleged defense of the property.
It was overkill, and he had the recordings to prove it.
On Nov. 22 in Little Falls, Minnesota, Smith planned a trap for whoever intended to steal from him that day. Purportedly “living in fear” after a burglary the month prior, the retiree informed a responding officer that several of his guns were missing from the home. Although only one of these incidents were reported to local police, Smith maintained that there were other invasions of his privacy that resulted in a loss of possessions, but he did not bring those incidents to their attention.
Noticing a neighbor he believed responsible for the crimes getting close to his house, Smith moved his truck so that it appeared he was away, then took to hiding, the recorder and firearms ready beside him. Brady and Kifer came for a day of petty theft, yet security cameras and audio from the home not only captured them breaking in, but their final moments alive.
The younger was first to enter through a window, moving downstairs where Smith hid from view. He would be unable to warn his cousin.
“You’re dead,” Smith said to the deceased, wrapping his body in a tarp to move it, then resuming position. Kifer likely wondered why she could not hear anything from Brady and began her own descent, falling down the stairs with the first loud gunshot.
