Mariah Samuels' killer convicted of 1st degree murder, will receive life sentence without parole
Samuels' murder spurred questions about why Minneapolis police failed to protect her
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The man who killed 34-year-old Mariah Samuels in Minneapolis in September faces a life sentence in prison without the possibility of parole following his conviction on first-degree murder charges Wednesday.
David Eugene Wright, 51, was Samuels’ ex-boyfriend. She took out an order for protection against Wright after he pistol-whipped her a month before her killing. She contacted Minneapolis police to complain that Wright had violated his protection order, including on the morning of her killing, when an officer declined to provide her with domestic violence resources, according to the initial investigation of the incident by the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Prosecutors said Wright rode up to Samuels’ family home in north Minneapolis on a bicycle on Sept. 14 and shot Samuels about 10 times. She was declared dead at the scene. A medical examiner’s report later said she’d died of multiple gunshot wounds.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement following Wright’s conviction that Samuels did everything the system asks of domestic violence survivors, but the system still failed her.
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“Each part of that system Mariah interacted with must hold itself accountable and take a hard look at what can be done to avoid these failures in the future,” Moriarty said.
Samuels’ family has accused Minneapolis officers of failing to help protect her. In response, police chief Brian O’Hara vowed to do a thorough review of the case and ordered all officers to be retrained in how to handle domestic violence calls.
O’Hara and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey both said at the time that Samuel’s killing was a tragedy, but said that inadequate staffing in the department’s domestic violence unit was a factor.
Samuels was a mother of two who loved animals and lived her life passionately, according to her family. They have said her case is similar to both Allison Lussier, an Indigenous woman found dead in her apartment in 2024, and Davis Moturi, a Black man who was shot by a neighbor after months of harassment. Supporters of all three allege that Minneapolis police did nothing to protect them after they reported harassment.
