MAGNA, Utah (ABC4) — After over 7 years, Brandon Beau Warren was convicted on June 9 of murder in the deaths of Stevan Chambers and Shelli Brown from August 2015, according to a Salt Lake County press release.
Warren was found guilty by a jury of two counts of murder and four counts of felony discharge of a firearm, all first-degree felonies. He was found not guilty of six additional counts of felony discharge of a firearm, according to court documents.
Initially, Warren was deemed mentally incompetent to stand trial on unrelated charges until October 2018, according to court documents. During that time, he was a patient at the Utah State Hospital in Provo. He was then transported to the Salt Lake County Jail.
Trial dates were set four times since 2018, but were all canceled before they began. A nine-day trial finally began in May 2023 and the jury convicted Warren on Friday, June 9.
On Aug. 17, 2015, Chambers, 26, was found dead in an intersection in Magna. Brown, also 26, was found dead in Magna Copper Park two days later. Police say they had both been shot in the head with the same .38 caliber handgun.
“We discovered some DNA, some fingerprints as well,” Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill told ABC4 in 2016. “As the forensic evidence indicated that the casings came from the same gun as well as the bullets indicated they were fired from the same weapon.”
One of the victim’s sisters Tiffany Chambers had expressed frustration early on with the trial delay.
“Our jails and our prisons are full of mentally ill people so while my brother’s dead, while we all wait, [Warren] gets to sit there and eat Valium and pudding all day,” Tiffany said in 2016.
Not only did the conviction take nearly 8 years, but Warren was not arrested in connection to the murders for over a year. Tiffany Chambers had previously said the process was “agonizing” for family members as they searched for closure.
Stevan Chambers’ girlfriend was 7 months pregnant when he was killed and his daughter is now 7 or 8 years old at the time of Warren’s conviction. Brown’s daughter was 7 years old and is now 14 or 15.
“We want to thank the loved ones of Mr. Chambers and Ms. Brown for their patience throughout the prosecution of this case,” Gill said following the trial. “We hope that this conviction will bring solace to them and facilitate their healing from the tragic loss they have experienced.”
Gill also commended the prosecutors for their “persistent dedication” and thanked law enforcement for their investigation that made the conviction possible.
Warren’s sentencing is scheduled to take place on August 21, almost 8 years to the day of the two murders, the release said.