A Baldwin County jury on Thursday convicted a 21-year-old Alabama man of capital murder in the shooting and pickax killings of his grandparents, his brother and a family friend, a rampage that prosecutors say began just hours after he was released from jail on a lesser charge stemming from the same fight.

Jurors deliberated roughly three hours before finding Jared Tarant Smith-Bracy guilty following six days of testimony over the February 2023 killings at a home on Melanie Loop in the Lake Forest area of Daphne. Killed were his grandmother, 72-year-old Barbara Smith; his grandfather, 80-year-old Lenard Smith; his 27-year-old brother, Jeremy Smith; and family friend Sheila Glover, 71.

Prosecutors said Smith-Bracy used a handgun and a pickax on his victims. Forensic evidence presented at trial, as detailed by WPMI NBC 15, showed the pickax struck the four victims a combined 38 times as he emptied the 15-round magazine of a borrowed Glock handgun.

A Morning Argument, an Early Release

Investigators say the violence traced back to that same morning, when Barbara Smith told her grandson to do the dishes. Smith-Bracy became enraged and tried to break down a bedroom door to reach her, prompting a 911 call. Because Alabama law at the time did not classify a confrontation with a grandparent as domestic violence, officers arrested him only on a charge of criminal mischief, and he bonded out of the Daphne jail around 5 p.m. that same day. He then had a friend drive him back to the house, grabbed the friend's handgun and forced his way inside, according to 1819 News's reporting on the case.

At trial, the defense argued Smith-Bracy suffered from undiagnosed, untreated schizophrenia at the time of the killings and questioned whether he had the mental capacity to understand what he was doing. Prosecutors countered with forensic and physical evidence tying him to the scene. The jury sided with the state on a single count of capital murder of two or more people.

The death penalty was not sought, meaning the only sentence available is life in prison without the possibility of parole. Circuit Judge Scott Taylor has not yet set a sentencing date.

Chief Assistant District Attorney Teresa Heinz called the verdict a somber milestone rather than a victory.

"It's difficult to navigate. It's difficult emotionally. There's no winners here. Justice was served." — Chief Assistant DA Teresa Heinz

Defense attorney Thomas Pilcher pushed back on the outcome, saying he believed the case relied on incomplete investigative work and that, in his view, justice was not served.

Family members of the victims described relief after more than three years of waiting. Sheila Glover's sisters said the verdict was not closure but that they were thankful, and relative Diana Glover-Samuel remembered her as a woman who was easy to love.

Smith-Bracy's defense is expected to retain the right to appeal following sentencing. Baldwin County prosecutors have not said when that hearing will be scheduled.