Ex-Virginia Tech linebacker Isi Etute set for murder trial, likely with a controversial defense

Former Virginia Tech linebacker Isi Etute told police that he didn’t return to the apartment in downtown Blacksburg, Virginia, last summer "with full intentions to just beat him up."

But when he confirmed that the person he knew on Tinder as "Angie" was actually a man, that is what happened.

Etute admitted to hitting Angie – who family members later identified as an openly gay man named Jerry Paul Smith – five times with his right hand, then kicking him in the face when he was on the ground, according to excerpts of an interview with police included in a federal search warrant application. He claimed that Smith wasn't talking when he left the apartment but appeared to be breathing and "making noises." Only later, Etute told police, did he notice the blood on his sandals.