2 Men Charged for Setting 20-Year-Old on Fire Who Told Man’s Wife They Were in Relationship

A family is mourning a young woman who had dreams of becoming an orthodontist, but enrolled in beauty school after discovering she had a talent for making people look good.

Criminal charges were filed for the case of a 20-year-old Milwaukee woman who was allegedly shot and burned after telling the wife of a married man she had been seeing about their relationship.

According to CBS 58, police said the victim, a young woman by the name of Kania Brunson, met up with the married man, identified as Sutan Shareef, on the day of the murder. A friend of Shareef said he called the police after he spotted the two in Shareef’s car on Sept. 24. Allegedly, Shareef was seen on top of Brunson as she was pleading for help, screaming, “He cut my throat.”

Police reportedly located Brunson and Shareef after being called to an alley near Keefe Avenue and Palmer Street. When they arrived on the scene, the victim appeared to have been tied, shot, and set on fire.

Medical examiners reported Brunson’s death as a homicide.

WISN 12 News reported that Shareef has been charged with first-degree intentional homicide and mutilating a corpse. Shareef’s brother-in-law, Johnny Hopgood, has been identified as an accomplice in the murder, as he allegedly joined Shareef to dispose of Brunson’s body by setting her remains on fire. Hopgood is charged with mutilating a corpse and harboring or aiding a felon.

“I wasn’t even there 30 minutes and they called and told me her car was found, and I knew then, at that point, like something happened to her,” Brunson’s mother Jennifer Meadows said to CBS 58.

Reportedly, Shareef contacted Brunson’s mother a week prior to the incident saying, “I want to be done messing with your daughter but she’s reaching out to my wife.”

After police questioned Shareef’s wife, she claimed he had been with her on the night of the murder. However, video evidence proved her claims to be false.

“I won’t stop until I find out who did this to my daughter. I wouldn’t want no parent or anybody to go through this,” the victim’s father Shawnte Brunson said in an interview with WISN 12 News earlier in October..

Shareef’s bond is set at $500,000, while bond for Hopgood is $50,000. Both men are reportedly scheduled to appear in court again.