Authorities said the killing unfolded in minutes at a Newbury Park home before deputies found the suspect nearby.
NEWBURY PARK, Calif. — The criminal case over the killing of 15-year-old Zayde Koehohou reached its most decisive turn when his older half-brother, Zuberi Sharp, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in Ventura County.
That plea, entered March 30, turned the story from a question of trial proof into a record of what prosecutors say happened on Dec. 5, 2024, at a family home on Jeanne Court. It also fixed the next date in the case: a May 5 sentencing hearing at which Sharp, 26, faces 15 years to life in prison. Prosecutors said he admitted not only the murder count but also great bodily injury and factors alleging he used a weapon and targeted a particularly vulnerable victim.
According to the district attorney’s account, the violence began in a converted backyard shed where the brothers had been left alone. The victim’s uncle, walking toward the structure to check on them, heard what prosecutors described as a loud thud. When he stepped inside, authorities said, he saw Sharp standing over Zayde while holding a pickaxe. At about 8 p.m., prosecutors said, the boys’ mother called 911 to report that her older son had attacked her younger son. Those details place the first outside witness, the first emergency call and the first law enforcement response within the same brief stretch of the evening.
Deputies arrived to find the aftermath already shifting. Sharp had fled before officers reached the house, prosecutors said. Zayde’s mother was holding the injured teen in her lap when deputies got there, and the boy was taken to a hospital, where he died shortly after arrival. The official account says Zayde had cerebral palsy, a fact that later shaped the prosecution’s treatment of the case and the aggravating factor that Sharp admitted in court. What remains unclear in the public record is what triggered the attack, what was said between the brothers beforehand and whether anyone else had contact with them in the shed before the uncle walked in.
From there, the case moved quickly from a home scene to a nearby public search. Deputies soon received reports of a man acting erratically on the football field at Newbury Park High School, according to prosecutors. They found Sharp there after he had removed his clothing and took him into custody. That arrest detail became one of the most widely repeated facts in the case because it helped define the final minutes after the killing: a suspect gone from the home, a neighborhood alert to unusual behavior and deputies locating him within the same community. But authorities have released little beyond that broad sequence.
The plea also cast fresh light on how prosecutors chose to resolve the case. Rather than proceed to a jury trial on the murder charge and related allegations, the district attorney’s office accepted a guilty plea that still leaves Sharp facing a life-top sentence under California law. Senior Deputy District Attorney David Russell, who handled the prosecution in the office’s Major Crimes Homicide Unit, said the result would spare relatives from reliving the killing in court. In practical terms, the plea means there will be no public trial testimony from the uncle, the mother or responding deputies unless something unusual happens at sentencing.
For the community, the case has remained rooted in the contrast between the ordinary setting and the severity of the violence. Jeanne Court is part of a suburban neighborhood, and the key locations named by investigators are familiar local spaces: a family backyard, a detached shed and a high school football field. That geography gave the case a close-to-home feel from the start. Public attention later widened because reports after the arrest raised questions about Sharp’s mental condition, while family remarks suggested relatives were trying to reconcile the brutality of the attack with their own memories of the brothers’ relationship.
What comes next is narrow but important. Sharp remains in custody without bail and is scheduled to be sentenced at 9 a.m. May 5 in courtroom 12 of Ventura County Superior Court, where the judge will decide the punishment after the guilty plea already settled the question of guilt.
Author note: Last updated April 23, 2026.