This Is How We Rise

Anchorage Police knew about a man who preyed on the most marginalized.

POLICE WERE TOLD OF MURDER AND DID NOT INVESTIGATE

There were two heroic women that defied the odds and reported him, one a full year before he tortured and murdered Kathleen Jo Henry.

Brian Steven Smith was reported to Anchorage PD a full year before Valerie Casler contacted the police in September 2019 about an SD card she said she had found.

Smith had shown her video and images of a woman he had shot and sexually assaulted. Alicia was horrified and shocked. She was knew he wasn’t lying or playing a game, and wanted to get the information to the police. After her initial call to Crime Stoppers she spent the next month trying to get Smith to send her the video or images he had shown her. She showed texts to Anchorage PD where she brought it up to Smith, trying to get him to talk more about what he had shown her.

For over a month, she was in near daily contact with Anchorage PD. The police tried to shrug off her texts and summed it up to sexual fantasy. Alicia did everything she could, even bringing them to the Eklutna Power Plant, a place that Smith had brought her and boasted he had “dumped a body”. He pointed out an old mattress and a black bag he said he used. The black bag was taken into evidence after a search dog picked up a scent. That black bag was later thrown away by mistake.

Reading the messages below between Alicia and Smith, keep in mind she was in daily contact with police, as you can see from the Anchorage PD Narratives above. Alicia is texting Smith and trying to get him to send her the video and talk about what he had shown her. She in no way was complicit or condoned his actions, rather she contacted the police and tried to get them to listen to her. They did not.

They never once went to question him. Other women went missing during this time. By the end of September 2018 Alicia moved back down south near her family, she wanted out of Alaska before they questioned Smith.

The police never did contact Smith. Left to continue without consequence, Smith murdered Kathleen Jo Henry on September 4, 2019, in Anchorage, Alaska.

A few weeks later Smith picks up a gutsy Valerie Casler who he drives around with for awhile. He tries to pull money out of the ATM, with no luck. Valerie ends up taking his burner phone from the dash of his truck, and after he drops her off and she looks through the phone, she sees the images and the videos. At first she didn’t know what to do. Seeing what she saw, she was afraid.

She told other women she knew to stay away from him, and she went to see a counselor, who supported her decision to give the video and images to the police. Still, she was afraid of getting arrested for theft, and for prostitution. Two misdemeanor crimes. Talking to the police, confiding in the police, is what many people in her shoes do not want to do. There is no trust. She was afraid.

Community United for Safety and Protection (CUSP) had gained immunity for sex workers to report crimes like murder on the state level, with the statute modified in 2016 as part of SB91. In 2017 immunity for sex workers on the Anchorage municipal level was granted, but not without opposition from critics.

Not many knew about the immunity sex workers had to report heinous crimes without fear of being arrested for prostitution.

Local media didn’t cover that win. No one really got the memo.

Even as I write this I am looking for links to insert to show that immunity was granted. One article, commenting on the municipal immunity with a short sentence about the statute change was shared by Alaska Public Media, PBS. I have it all in here, unless you want to read the long SB91. Maybe you do, so here you go.

If Valerie had known she had no fear of being arrested, the phone with all the hidden files, deleted data – information that could possibly show other women Smith had harmed – might have been in the hands of police.

In Alaska, immunity can catch killers

A 2016 state law allows sex workers to report heinous crimes without prosecution. The author urges extending this to their clients.

But she didn’t know.

She transferred the images and videos over to an SD card, labeled it so police would know what they were looking at, and called it in on September 30, 2018. She told Anchorage PD she had found the SD card on the ground near 13th Ave. and Fairbanks Street.

Anchorage PD took note when they saw what was written on the SD card “Homicide at Midtown Marriot”.

What would have happened if Valerie hadn’t called?

The video initiated an investigation, and through that investigation, an interrogation. Smith was out of state at the time, and shortly after Valerie gave the police the SD card, Kathleen Jo Henry was found by railroad workers.

Read the texts.

During his interrogation on October 8, 2019 Smith confessed to another murder, and from pictures he identified Veronica Abouchuk.

When the Alaska State Troopers found human remains near mile 4.5 of the Old Glenn Highway of a woman in April 2019, the remains were sent to the Medical Examiner.

Veronica’s missing person report was closed at the time, she wasn’t listed as a missing person anymore. She had been listed, but then her family had been told she had passed on August 6, 2018, and that had closed out the missing person report.

Yet the woman who the police had claimed was Veronica was not Veronica – it was a different woman who just happened to have her ID.

Veronica Abouchuk was last seen July 2018.

Her daughter had to do another missing person report, and that wasn’t put into the system until February 2019.

On October 11th, 2019, the human remains were identified as Veronica.

Police found deleted videos and images of Veronica’s murder when they went thru Smith’s various phones he had at home. Videos and images of what Alicia had described over a year before. Finally, Veronica Abouchuk’s family would have answers.

That still leaves the question about Alicia telling Anchorage PD about a woman that Smith had stated he murdered and left in the very area Veronica was found. The Eklutna Power Plant.

No one put those clues together at Anchorage PD.

The Anchorage PD stated they recognized the man’s voice from a previous investigation when they watched what was on the SD card. The investigation Alicia had tried to initiate, that they closed without questioning Smith.

After Smith’s arrest, Alicia read and watched everything. It is only speculated by her family, but the sadness, guilt and frustration of not being heard by the Anchorage PD when she had contacted them in August 2018 caused her emotional distress, and sadly on July 4th, 2021 at the tender age of 41, Alicia left this world.

She became a victim of Smith’s as well, the horror of what she felt she could have prevented – had tried to prevent by countless calls and conversations with Anchorage PD – had done nothing but bring her to the point of utter despair.

When the FBI and Anchorage PD had contacted her and had her testify to the Grand Jury after his arrest, it all became too much.

I can only assume that she was not offered any victim services, because I know Valerie, who had watched the videos and saw the images of Kathleen Jo Henry on Smith’s phone, never was.

Three years to the day from Alicia’s funeral I sat down to interview Smith.

There is a longer story to how I arrived at a place where I, a sex worker, was able to walk into the very facility where Smith has sat since his arrest in 2019.

Ten years to the day, July 9, 2014, I myself was sitting behind those walls on charges stemming from being a sex worker and working with other sex workers for our safety.

2014. The very year that Smith arrived in Alaska, his new hunting grounds.

Listen as Smith states, in this recording on July 9, 2024, that if he “was an international killer and had been questioned, if they had, I would immediately say the police are watching me, I have gotten away with it, because they don’t have a body, then that would have stopped me from doing anything”.

AB: If the police had questioned you, what did you tell me about that?

BS: Okay, so, so, if I actually was this international killer, um,

AB: International killer?

BS: Yeah. Because remember, I told her that I killed people all over the world. It wasn’t just the South Africa people. I told her I traveled around. Everytime I told her something it was always exotic, the more exotic it was. So they had a lot of reason, probable cause, to speak to me, to come and speak to me, but they didn’t.

BS: If they had, if I was actually the fellow, and they had come to speak to me, I would immediately say, oh, the police are watching me, I’ve gotten away with this because they didn’t find the body, so I’m not going to do anything wrong ever again while I’m here, I’m going to wait until I move to another town, you know?

BS: So, if the police had contacted me and I am guilty that contact would have stopped me doing anything and therefore any this that happens after that 23rd or even after the crime stopper thing already because I mean she initially right in the beginning she gave them all the recordings so any deaths after that could have been prevented.

BS: If I am guilty then those deaths could have been well would have been prevented because I would not have done, it’s called preventative crime.

What BS says highlights the crucial role of proactive police work. BS admits that had the police questioned him, their intervention would have stopped him from committing further crimes. This is a powerful example of “preventative crime”—the idea that diligent investigation can stop criminals in their tracks and prevent future harm.

In Alaska, sex workers and Alaska Native women are particularly vulnerable. We are often easy prey due to systemic neglect and marginalization. When the police fail to investigate crimes, they allow further violence.

The Smith case is just one example of the consequences of not investigating. By failing to even question Smith, law enforcement allowed Smith to continue to be a predator to our community. He was able to murder Kathleen Jo Henry.

The third victim, the one that the Amended Hybrid Witness filing listed, as well as other paperwork from Smith, detailed the Anchorage PD had those images since he was arrested in October 2019.

Only after the prosecution filed court records on July 3, 2024, that showed insensitive and harmful crime scene photos – as well as a lack luster forensic sketch that has yet to be shared with the public from Anchorage PD – do we see that there was another woman that was murdered by Smith.

Cassandra Lee Boskofsky.

Police had done very little into her investigation. They had photos for 5 years that could have very easily resulted in an identification, yet that did not seem important.

The information we did have from the filings and paperwork from Smith was not specific, except for dates – Sept. 16 thru 19, 2019.

When the July 3, 2024 filing was pulled, it was painfully clear how much information Anchorage PD had. The three images, previously deleted and recovered from his phone during his arrest in October 2019, were damning.

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Cassandra was reported missing by her family members in August 2019.

The images from Smith’s phone at the time of his arrest depict a woman likely deceased. They were used to create a composite sketch after pressure from what I will call “The Three” due to finding mention of the images in a Hybrid Sentencing Reports filed in court in December 2023 and January 2024, and the legal paperwork given by Brian Steven Smith.

These images were never entered into evidence at Smith’s trial in February 2024, nor discussed. 

In the additional legal paperwork given by Smith, investigators wrote they “do not know if the woman is deceased or alive in the images”. The photos have been known to investigators since Smith’s arrest in October 2019.

The images and forensic sketch were released in a Sentencing Memorandum, dated July 3, 2024, for the sentencing of convicted murderer Brian Steven Smith, which took place on July 12, 2024. 

Found during a routine information pull on Smith’s case, on July 6, 2024, one of The Three contacted Anchorage Police Homicide Detective Brenden Lee to request that they contact the Boskofsky family for identification because The Three had matched physical descriptions of Cassandra Lee Boskofsky to the the graphic and disturbing crime scene images in the Sentencing Memorandum. 

The Boskofsky family were shown images on Facebook Messenger by Detective Lee on July 6 , 2024 and this resulted in an immediate identification of their missing loved one from these crime scene photos. 

Family members that identified Cassandra were called in to speak to District Attorney Dunlop and Detective Lee the morning of Smith’s Sentencing, July 12, 2024.

During Smith’s sentencing and discussion of the Sentencing Memorandum, Judge Saxby was told the woman in the crime scene photos was not identified – as Cassandra’s family sat in the front row.

One can only wonder how hurtful that must have felt for her family to hear.

Anchorage PD has not released the sketch to the public as of this date. 

Sadly, both Anchorage PD and the district attorney continue to claim that the woman in the photographs remains unidentified. 

To date, Cassandra’s remains have not been located.

There is a $500 REWARD for information.

Brian Steven Smith was reported in August 2018 by Alicia Youngblood due to a video he had shown her, which was the murder of Veronica Abouchuk.

At that time, no one questioned Smith. The community deserves transparency and accountability from Anchorage PD regarding their handling of this case.

Cassandra Lee Boskofsky’s family deserves answers, justice, and a full investigation into her disappearance and pictures of her in a convicted murderers phone. A man known to video and take images of women he killed. 

Anchorage Police knew about a man who preyed on the most marginalized.

Police “clean the streets” tearing down homeless encampments that often times become communities, and lawmakers create laws that ushers sex workers away to dark corners alone. This enables marginalized women to become invisible.

The women society looks down on are easy for the predators to focus on.

Respectability policing, who is worthy of a search, who is worthy of an investigation, who is worthy of a missing person listing, has created a systemic circle of harm.

There is more to the Smith trial and conviction than meets the eye.