A Milwaukee woman convicted of gunning down a 33-year-old mother of four outside a northwest side bar has been ordered to pay more than $42,000 in restitution, months after a judge sent her to prison for 25 years. April Miller, now 51, was sentenced in August for first-degree reckless homicide and first-degree reckless injury in the shooting death of Brenisha Butcher and the wounding of Butcher's younger sister outside Bar 107.
According to FOX6 News Milwaukee, a judge on Oct. 8 ordered Miller to pay $12,730 in restitution to a victim and another $30,920 to the Wisconsin Department of Justice's Crime Victim Compensation Fund, bringing her total restitution obligation to more than $42,000. The outlet reports Miller pleaded guilty to both counts in June, and in August, Judge David Swanson sentenced her to 25 years in prison followed by 15 years of extended supervision, with credit for more than a year's time served.
A Night That Started With a Bar Fight
The shooting unfolded outside the bar near 107th Street and Granville Road in Milwaukee, per the station's report. Witnesses said a fight inside the bar led security to clear everyone out, and that Miller and the victims were not involved in that altercation, according to witness statements cited in the same account.
Surveillance video reviewed by investigators showed a white Volkswagen move alongside a gray Nissan SUV before the Volkswagen almost immediately crashed into a parked vehicle as the Nissan drove away, the report states. A criminal complaint said officers arrived to find the white Volkswagen apparently crashed into a parked vehicle across from the bar, where they found Brenisha Butcher dead in the driver's seat. Her sister, identified by family as Brittney, told police someone had shot at them from another vehicle and was taken to a hospital, Milwaukee police said.
Witness Account and Arrest
A witness told investigators that Miller, who had been sitting in the front passenger seat of the Nissan, pointed a gun at the Volkswagen and fired multiple times, the article notes. That witness later identified Miller as the shooter from a photo lineup. Detectives recovered a gun believed to be the weapon used in the shooting, and court filings say Miller was arrested two days later while hiding in a hotel room.
Wisconsin law generally requires a defendant ordered to pay restitution to deliver the money or property to the state for transfer to the victim or another person covered by the order, according to the Wisconsin Legislature's statute governing such orders.
A Bar With a History of Violence
The shooting outside Bar 107 was one of three separate incidents Milwaukee police investigated within about an hour that night, with additional shootings reported near 76th Street and Thurston Avenue and near Third Street and Vienna Avenue, according to CBS 58. Bar 107 had a troubled track record even before the fatal shooting: its tavern license was suspended for 30 days in 2022 following an earlier shooting there, and the bar received warning letters tied to incidents in 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2023, per WISN.
In the aftermath, the bar's owner turned in its liquor license at city hall, and the business will not reopen, WISN reported. For Butcher's family, the restitution order closes one more chapter in a case that began with a night out that turned fatal and ended with a 25-year prison sentence for the woman convicted of killing her.
