A judge sentenced a 20-year-old Brooklyn man to 20 years in prison Thursday after he was convicted of a hate crime for fatally stabbing a Black, gay man at a Midwood gas station in 2023.
A jury found Dmitriy Popov guilty of first-degree manslaughter as a hate crime and other charges for stabbing O’Shae Sibley, 28. Jurors acquitted him of murder. Popov was 17 at the time of the stabbing, but Brooklyn prosecutors tried him as an adult.
Justice Dena Douglas sentenced Popov to 20 years in prison for the manslaughter charge and 1 year in prison to run concurrently for the other charges, followed by 5 years of post-supervision release.
On July 29, 2023, Sibley and his friends were dancing to Beyoncé in their bathing suits while they refueled at the end of a beach day. Popov, who worked at a smoke shop down the block, was inside the gas station’s mini mart getting food with a few friends.
When Popov and his friends stepped out of the mini mart and saw Sibley’s group, they started to yell homophobic slurs and telling them to leave, Sibley’s friends testified at trial. Surveillance footage played in court shows Popov recording on his cellphone and mouthing words, though the security footage does not include audio. Popov testified at trial that he was “not sure” what happened to the video he recorded and that he threw away his phone.
After several minutes of verbal back-and-forth, Popov took a knife out of his pocket, according to surveillance footage. The video then shows Sibley running toward Popov. Popov stabbed Sibley in the torso and punctured his heart, killing him.