WEBSTER PARISH, La. (KTAL/KMSS) — A Webster Parish jury on Friday found an Arkansas man guilty of murder in the 2020 shooting death of a Springhill man.
According to the Bossier/Webster Parish District Attorney’s office, it took the jury less than an hour and a half to find 23-year-old Logan Smith of Taylor, Ark. guilty of second-degree murder in the death of 37-year-old Anthony Bruns.
Bruns’s body was found on the side of Percy Burns Road in Springhill on June 19, 2020. Prosecutors say he was killed in another location and dumped on the side of the road, where he was found by a passing driver.
During the trial, jurors heard testimony from Major Phillip Krouse, a case agent from the Webster Parish Sheriff’s Office, who walked them through the investigation and evidence that led investigators to Smith, including a missing shoe. When Bruns body was found, he was missing a shoe.
Detectives found the shoe and a piece of bloody carpet in the back of a wrecked vehicle. The DA’s office said DNA testing determined that the blood was from the victim and the bloody carpet matched a piece that was ripped from a vehicle driven by Smith.
“This case was about trying to find a missing shoe, but it’s no Cinderella story. It’s a story about a cold-blooded murderer who shot Anthony Bruns because, as he said he wanted relief from the devil that has been on him. Unfortunately, for the Bruns family, they get no relief,” Assistant District Attorney Jimbo Yocom said in the release.
The case was prosecuted by Jimbo Yocom and Melanie McCullough of the Webster Parish District Attorney’s office and was defended by Mary Ellen Halterman and David Shepherd.
Smith faces mandatory life in prison for second-degree murder and will be sentenced by Judge Charles Smith on December 16, 2022.
