Jurors found Isaac Christopher Smith guilty of two counts of first-degree murder.
PITTSBURGH, Pa. — An Allegheny County jury convicted Isaac Christopher Smith on Friday in the 2021 shooting death of Karli Short, a pregnant McKeesport woman found dead in a backyard after she was shot once in the head.
Smith, 30, was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder after jurors deliberated for about two hours. Short, 26, was five months pregnant when she was killed in the early morning hours of Sept. 13, 2021. Pennsylvania law requires Smith to receive two life sentences without parole.
Short was found in the rear yard of a McKeesport house after a neighbor discovered her body near an alley. She was the daughter of Brandon Short, a former Penn State standout and NFL linebacker. The verdict followed eight days of testimony in a Downtown Pittsburgh courtroom before Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Kevin G. Sasinoski.
Prosecutors said Smith killed Short because he feared her pregnancy would expose what Deputy District Attorney Ryan Kiray called a double life. They told jurors Smith had been seeing Short while also maintaining a long-term relationship with another woman. Kiray said Smith’s burner phone was the last phone to call Short minutes before the shooting.
Prosecutors also pointed to a revolver they said Smith bought six weeks before Short was killed and pawned two weeks afterward. Kiray told jurors the gun was the murder weapon. First Assistant District Attorney Rebecca Spangler said after the verdict that prosecutors were thankful to bring “some measure of justice to Karli and all her family.”
The defense argued Smith had no motive and denied killing Short. Defense attorney Thomas N. Farrell said Smith believed the baby was not his and had told detectives again and again that he did not do it. Farrell said after the verdict that the defense accepted the jury’s decision but was disappointed and would review the case.
Smith had gone voluntarily to Allegheny County Police headquarters in Green Tree after Short’s body was found. Detectives testified that he denied involvement during that interview. He told investigators he and Short had been intimate, that she was pregnant and that she believed the baby might be his.
The district attorney’s office earlier sought the death penalty but later withdrew that notice. Smith is scheduled to be sentenced at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday before Judge Sasinoski.
Author note: Last updated May 31, 2026.