A Philadelphia jury has convicted 28-year-old Justin Smith of first-degree murder in the 2021 shooting death of his pregnant girlfriend, Dianna Brice, rejecting his claim that the gun fired accidentally during a struggle. Common Pleas Court Judge Anthony Kyriakakis sentenced Smith to life in prison without the possibility of parole, the mandatory outcome under Pennsylvania law for a first-degree murder conviction. The verdict closes a case that began with Brice's disappearance in March 2021 and stretched across a four-year, multi-state manhunt before Smith's capture in Atlanta.
Brice, 21, was last seen driving with Smith from a Delaware County laundromat into Philadelphia on March 30, 2021, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. She was 14 weeks pregnant with Smith's child at the time. Trial testimony indicated the pair had argued after Brice learned she had tested positive for herpes, and prosecutors said gunfire struck her head 11 times, with a twelfth shot hitting her right shoulder, all fired in a matter of seconds. Medical examiner testimony from forensic pathologist Lindsay Simon stated that the gunshots would almost certainly have killed Brice instantaneously.
Smith testified that Brice held a gun to his head before turning it on herself, and separately said the weapon accidentally discharged while he tried to take it from her. Prosecutor Lauren Crump challenged Smith's claim that the Glock handgun belonged to Brice and argued that the concentrated pattern of gunshot wounds to the left side of her head and face was inconsistent with an accidental discharge during a struggle. The jury ultimately rejected Smith's account of an accident, returning a guilty verdict on charges including first-degree murder, third-degree murder, abuse of a corpse, arson, and related crimes after a trial that lasted three days.
How Investigators Traced the Killing
Upper Darby Police first launched the search after Brice's mother reported her missing, noting Brice had never before failed to call and check on her then-4-year-old son, a routine she kept daily. Investigators used cell phone location data and found that Brice's phone traveled the same path as Smith's phone until 1:38 p.m. on the day she disappeared, when, per trial testimony, Smith's phone went dark. Philadelphia police surveillance cameras later showed Smith and co-defendant Tylydia Garnett loading a large object into a rented Hyundai sedan.
Smith told investigators he disposed of Brice's body and burned his car with the gun still inside, though prosecutors reported the weapon was never recovered. Police found his dark gray Ford Fusion burned to a blackened shell near Florence Avenue and 59th Street, about one mile from where Brice's body was ultimately discovered in a wooded area near 58th Street and Eastwick Avenue seven days after her death. The Hyundai was traced to both the body disposal location and a gas station where its driver purchased a canister of fuel later used to set the Fusion ablaze.
The Co-Defendant's Role and Guilty Plea
Garnett testified that Smith confessed to her that he shot Brice, and prosecutors said she helped him flee to Florida before he eventually settled in Georgia. Garnett was arrested in April 2021 after fleeing to Miami and was released on $75,000 bail, a decision that drew significant public outrage at the time, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer's earlier reporting. She later pleaded guilty to arson, abuse of a corpse, and related crimes and was sentenced to 11½ to 23 months.
Smith, meanwhile, fled Pennsylvania for Florida while attempting to reach Cuba, evading capture for nearly four years. He later said he did not call for help after the shooting because he felt the situation would not go his way. In August 2023, a federal arrest warrant charging him with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution was issued in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, after which the FBI offered a reward of up to $25,000 for information leading to his capture, according to FOX43.
A Fugitive's Capture in Atlanta
The manhunt ended in March 2025, when Atlanta police arrested Smith during a traffic stop on Oak Street SW after a license plate reader flagged his vehicle. Per FOX 5 Atlanta, Smith gave a fake name, “Prince Kareem,” and attempted to flee on foot before a mobile fingerprint scanner confirmed his true identity. That capture, previously reported by Hoodline's earlier report, brought Smith back to Philadelphia to face trial.
Brice's family expressed relief after the guilty verdict, according to the Inquirer's report. Brice, a 2019 Upper Darby High School graduate, had been scheduled to begin phlebotomy classes to become a dialysis technician before her death, according to CBS News. She left behind an 8-year-old son who was 4 at the time of her murder.
Part of a Broader Pattern of Violence
Brice's death fits into a documented national pattern. A study of CDC mortality data from 2005 to 2022, presented by Columbia University researchers, found that homicide and suicide are the leading causes of maternal death in the United States, surpassing deaths from obstetric complications such as hemorrhage, sepsis, or hypertension, according to the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine. Research cited by the group also found that more than 55% of violent pregnancy-related deaths in the U.S. involve firearms, with intimate partner violence as the primary factor preceding these homicides.
That same research found young Black birthing individuals ages 18 to 24 face a homicide-related death rate of nearly 8 per 100,000, almost four times the national average for pregnant women. The pattern echoes another Delaware County case Hoodline has covered, in which a Lansdowne teen faced similar charges after allegedly killing his pregnant girlfriend. Under Pennsylvania's Crimes Against Unborn Child Act, prosecutors are permitted to bring separate homicide charges for the death of an unborn child, a statutory framework that shaped the charges Smith ultimately faced alongside Brice's murder.
