‘Bittersweet’: Miya Brophy-Baermann’s family responds to killer’s guilty verdict

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — Just days after a guilty verdict was handed down to their daughter’s killer, Michelle Brophy-Baermann described the past two weeks and years since her daughter’s shooting death.

“Bittersweet,” said Brophy-Baermann. “It is so cliche to say. Everything I can say is so cliche because only people who have gone through this knows what it’s like.”

Isaiah Pinkerton, 26, was found guilty of murdering Miya Brophy-Baermann Thursday inside Providence Superior Court.

Prosecutors and police say Pinkerton killed Brophy-Baermann in a drive-by shooting in August 1, 2021 on Olney Street in Providence. He believed the man with Brophy-Baermann was a rival gang member. Pinkerton was with Shawn Mann in the car, who is awaiting a murder trial.

Nearly two years later, Michelle Brophy-Baermann and her family are one step closer to justice.

“I started to have to deal with a lot of nerves and a lot more memories of Miya came,” said Miya’s mother. “Losing a child is the worst possible thing that can happen to anyone.”

Miya, a Warwick native, was a recent graduate of Northeastern University and had plans to pursue a career in the speech pathology and audiology. Miya’s Voice, a scholarship fund in Brophy-Baermann’s name, helps other students pursue the same profession.

Michelle Brophy-Baermann added, “Without Miya’s Voice as a focus, I don’t know if I would be here. It has given me something to focus on to try and create a legacy.”

Brophy-Baermann plans to offer the second wave of scholarships to Rhode Island students this August.

Shawn Mann awaits trial for murder later this summer.