We Never Saw It Coming

The family of the ‘quiet’ SA man accused of brutally killing two women in Alaska are reeling after his arrest.

- Joanie Bergh

IT WAS just a sliver of plastic lying in the street but as it glinted in the light it caught her eye.

The woman, who was taking a stroll in Anchorage, Alaska in the USA, picked it up and saw it was a memory card with the words, “Homicide at midtown Marriott” written on the label.

Curiosity piqued, she took it home and plugged it into her computer – and nothing could have prepared her for what was to come next.

Video footage flashed across her screen showing a naked woman with long dark hair being subjected to a brutal beating on the floor of a hotel room.

Although the woman cried out in pain, her attacker showed no mercy. Instead, laughing and swearing, he started strangling her.

Pictures on the card taken a few hours later showed a different scene. The woman’s body, wrapped in a white blanket, was lying on a baggage trolley in the parking lot of the TownePlace Suites by Marriott hotel.

The last picture on the memory card was taken in the early hours of 6 September. It shows the woman lying on her stomach in the back of a black bakkie.

On 2 October, two days after the card was found, police in Anchorage found a corpse discarded next to a highway.

They believed it was the body of the woman in the videos, who was later identified as Kathleen Henry (30), a homeless person.

The police joined forces with the FBI and it wasn’t long before they connected the dots. Because of the man’s distinctive accent they identified him as Brian Steven Smith (48), a South African immigrant.

Brian, originally from Queenstown in the Eastern Cape, had been living with his wife, Stephanie Bissland (69), in Anchorage for the past five years.