A Brea man who gunned down a neighbor whom he was angry at for smoking too much on an outdoor apartment patio was sentenced Thursday, Dec. 11 to 50 years to life in prison.
Sidney Bararchie Clarke, 31, was convicted earlier this year of first-degree murder with a sentencing enhancement for the use of the a firearm for the Aug. 30, 2023 slaying of 21-year-old Logan Kahmar at the Raintree Apartments in the 600 block of N. Tamarack Avenue.
Clarke lived in the apartment unit above Kahmar, and for months had been angry at Kahmar’s habit of sitting on his lower-level balcony and smoking marijuana and cigarettes. A prosecutor wrote in a sentencing brief that Clarke “slowly burned with anger” toward Kahmar and his smoking and “this anger consumed him.”
On the evening of the shooting, Clarke grabbed his 9mm Glock pistol from a gun safe, walked down the stairs to Kahmar’s apartment and opened fire on Kahmar again and again, the prosecutor wrote.
Kahmar was able to call 911, screaming in apparent agony “I’ve been shot!”
Clarke reloaded, the prosecutor added, and fired a second round of gunfire, which included fatal headshots.
As Kahmar lay dying, his infant daughter was left alone in his apartment.
Officers found Kahmar dead in the fetal position in a pool of blood. Neighbors saw a dark SUV leaving right after the shooting.
Detectives found the open gun-safe with paperwork for a handgun in Clarke’s apartment and learned he owned a SUV that matched the vehicle seen leaving the complex. They put a bulletin out asking local law enforcement agencies to watch out for the SUV.
A Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputy spotted Clarke the next day, sitting in his vehicle in a Starbucks parking lot. After arresting Clarke, the deputy found a backpack with a Glock handgun and several rounds of ammo in his car.
Clarke’s wife told police that the smoke from Kahmar’s apartment had forced them to buy air purifiers, adding they were in the process of moving to a different apartment. Kahmar’s girlfriend acknowledged that Kahmar would smoke on the patio, and told police that the upstairs neighbor had thrown water on her when she had been outside smoking at one point.
The prosecutor wrote that Clarke claimed to authorities that Kahmar drank, yelled racial epithets, was a nuisance in the community and smoked on his patio. But, when asked about the shooting, Clarke’s attorney wrote that Clarke invoked God and the Ten Commandments and did not answer any questions.
“It is unconscionable that something as minor and innocuous as smoking drove the defendant to commit the heinous crime upon the victim,” Senior Deputy District Attorney Nick Thomo wrote in his sentencing brief.